


Exsanguination and Fiends

by themarkerfairy



Category: Magi: The Labyrinth of Magic
Genre: M/M, Vampires, because sometimes you've just gotta go for that cliche
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-12
Updated: 2017-07-12
Packaged: 2018-12-01 04:19:44
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11478474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/themarkerfairy/pseuds/themarkerfairy
Summary: Finding a starving vampire isn't part of the plan.  Taking one in definitely isn't.  Not that there was a plan.  But if Ja'far had one, it wouldn't be any of this.





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

> This is for magibb 2017! One day I'd love to continue with more snapshots and non sequitur adventures, but for now, this is how it stands.

Sinbad hits the ground with a thud, air knocked out of him and an uncomfortable burning sensation against his neck.  He looks up and sees pale skin and paler hair, thinks for a moment maybe he accidentally intruded on someone’s territory, and then realizes no vampire would be holding silver knives.  

He drops his head back against the pavement.  Ah, well.  He hadn’t exactly been living such a quality life that he’d miss it when it was gone.  It was probably for the best.  

Ja’far stops his slash right before it starts when the creature he’d jumped on suddenly goes limp.  He’s taken out more than his fair share of monsters, and none of them had gone down without a struggle to the death.  Ja’far digs his knife in harder and despite a reflexive twitch, nothing else happens.  

“Don’t play games,” he hisses.  “What are you, a decoy?  Bait for an ambush?”  It was unusual for vampires to travel in small groups, but not unheard of.  

Sinbad cracks open an eye.  “No games.  Just trying to await death calmly and with dignity.”

“Bullshit.”

“The least I can do is make it easier for whatever poor sap has to scrub me off the pavement.  No sense spraying body parts everywhere when I can die cleanly.”  

“What?”  Ja’far can’t sense anyone nearby, so assumes he isn’t stalling for time.  

“I could fight, but I’m weak and you’d win.  Even if you didn’t, someone would be cleaning up body parts.  I’ve seen it before.”  

Ja’far pauses long enough to actually examine the monster he has trapped beneath his knives, and realizes he’s right.  Everything about him --yellowed sclera, greenish skin, hollow cheeks; not to mention tattered clothes and tangled hair-- reads weak, sick, and tired.  “You’re alone?”  He presses the knife harder for emphasis and feels skin blister slightly beneath it.

“Have been for a very long time.  No one is going to come and avenge me, I promise.”  

Ja’far badly wants to just stab and be done with it, but finds it difficult to do.  He’s accustomed to death matches with rabid monsters, not pathetic surrenders in dingy alleys.  So against his training, he lifts his blades from the creature’s neck.  “What are you doing here?  I thought drifters knew to stay away from here by now.”  

In spite of himself, Sinbad sighs in relief at the removal of the most immediate pain from the burns.  “Sorry, I’m not exactly in the monster information circuit.  I’m just passing through.  I’ll leave, if you’re not going to kill me.”

“To go where?  I can’t exactly let you just go wandering off.”  

“Dunno.  Someplace else with warm alleys?”

“What?”  Ja’far doesn’t understand this conversation in the least.  

“Can’t exactly hold down a job to pay rent when you’re like me, can you?”

“You’re wandering around by yourself, like this?”  Ja’far is now even more confused.  “You could always take on grunt work in a bigger coven.”  A large and established group is the way he sees most new vampires survive, and he doesn’t know why this one didn’t do the same.

“I thought you were going to kill me.  Now you’re telling me to go join a vampire gang?”  

Ja’far shakes his head.  “No.  I just don’t understand.”  

“Most people wouldn’t, I expect.” 

“I’ve killed dozens of you and I’ve never had one just lay down and die.”

“Killed by a professional, apparently.  At least you’ll know what to do.”  

Ja’far’s paranoia finally comes back to haunt him, and he stands up, casting his senses around and waiting for a trap.  This can’t possibly be anything else.  It’s too abnormal.  But nothing is there, and the vampire he’d previously had trapped is still lying apathetically on the ground.  

“There’s no one there, I told you,” Sinbad reminds him.  

Ja’far just growls in frustration, gripping his weapons tightly.  “I don’t get it!”  

Sinbad just snorts and continues lying where he is.  He’s awfully tired, and doesn’t want to spare the energy to get up if it’s going to be for nothing.  

Ja’far kicks at him, trying to antagonize him into giving up whatever strange plan he has, give him any reason to kill. “Get up!”

“Ow!  Come on, if you’re as good as you say then you should be able to kill me without torturing me.  Unless you’re one of those sadistic fuckers with shotguns.  Those hurt, you know.  As does picking shot out of your own guts for hours.  Maybe I  _ will _ try and run if you do that.”  

Ja’far prods at him again.  “Why are you just lying there?!”  

“I’m dying, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

“Then get up and do something about it!”  Ja’far doesn’t know why he’s encouraging action.  Maybe it’s just that he can’t kill this thing when it’s like this, and just wants an excuse to get it over with, forget this awful aberration to his system, and go home.  

“Don’t want to.  Just the _ idea _ of eating any more pig’s blood makes me want to vomit.  I can’t do it anymore.”  

“So you’re going to lie there until you die?”

“I wasn’t exactly planning on it, but then you came along, and it seemed convenient.”  

“There are almost four hundred thousand people in this city.”

“Good for them.  They’ll all wake up tomorrow.  Well maybe they won’t, but not because of me.”  

“What is  _ wrong _ with you?” Ja’far hisses.  

“I believe I’m very sick and hungry.  I can’t figure out why that bothers you so much, since you’re clearly not exactly sympathetic.”  

“I have monsters I kill, and monsters I don’t.  You’re not one I know, are desperate enough to be potentially dangerous, and yet you aren’t giving me an excuse to kill you.   _ That’s  _ why I’m bothered!”

“Got some sort of code, have you?”  Sinbad gives a rueful laugh.  “More than most, I suppose.  Not that ‘shoot on sight’ is really that bad a policy, all things considered.”  

“Code,” Ja’far pinches his face in distaste.  “Yes, I suppose I do.  You’re lucky you ended up here, in that case.  This place and its damn code.”  

“Which you follow, apparently.”

“I’m a changed man, unfortunately.”  Ja’far takes one last look at the figure prone on the ground in front of him, concentrates hard to make sure there really isn’t anyone threatening around, and gives in to his instincts, no matter how much he doesn’t want to, how decades of training tell him he shouldn’t.  “Come on, get up.”  

“You can’t just kill me lying down?  I’m tired.”  

Ja’far kicks him once more.  “Stop lying on the ground like a dead fish.  It’s disgraceful, and it’d be embarrassing to have you on my record.”  Not to mention if anyone found out it was his kill, he’d likely be run out of town.  Ja’far knows he’s had one too many warnings.  

“Now I’m the one who doesn’t understand.”  And Sinbad really, really doesn’t.  Whatever decision making process is currently happening is different than the hunters he’s encountered.

“Don’t care.  Get up and walk.  I’ll pass you off on someone else tomorrow.”  

“To do what?”  

“I told you.  There are monsters I kill, and monsters I don’t.  Can’t kill you yet, and anyone who would take you hates me.  The only person who doesn’t is too far away to get to tonight.”

“So where are you planning to take me?”

“My apartment.”

“I know I only met you a few minutes ago, but that seems uncharacteristic.”

“It is.”  

Sinbad decides if he’s going to die, he might as well do it in a home rather than an alley, and staggers to his feet, leaning against the wall as his head spins dizzyingly.  “Lead the way, then.”  

Ja’far looks at the wobbling figure skeptically, but steps out of the alley.  At least he knows he’s truly not a threat, if he’s this bad.  It’s only a few blocks, since he’d been on his way home when he’d sensed an unknown signature, and they manage to make it to the building without incident.  

Sinbad looks up at the tall building in front of him.  “Please tell me there’s an elevator.”  Even trying to hide his weakness, he knows this hunter must have noticed how hard it was for him just to stay standing.  

Ja’far buzzes them inside and points to sliding steel doors.  Once the elevator is summoned, Sinbad slumps back against the wall and Ja’far pushes seven as the doors close.  His training says to be terrified of being in such an enclosed space with a predator, but his instincts say nothing.  Ja’far relies on his instincts and sensory training for everything, and none of it is warning of a threat.  He doesn’t know if that’s more of a frustration or a relief.  The doors open with a ding and they walk out into a hall, down a few doors, and to a door where Ja’far pulls out a key and unlocks it.  And then unlocks it again.  And then hauls a heavy bolt to the side.

Sinbad raises an eyebrow, but says nothing.

Ja’far walks into his apartment, and Sinbad stays standing outside.  When footsteps don’t follow, Ja’far turns around.  “Are you going to come in, or just stand there?”

“I can’t come in unless you invite me.”

Ja’far desperately resists the urge to laugh, because it’s not really a situation to laugh in if he wants to keep his reputation.  “You’ve got to be shitting me.”

“That’s the rule!”  

“Have you ever tried to break it?”

“I’ve mostly been trying very hard to stay  _ away _ from people’s personal spaces.”

“Well if you ever do get too close, that’s my reason to kill you, so don’t worry about it.”  

Sinbad takes a hesitant step forward, and crosses over the door frame.  “Oh.”

“Yeah, ‘oh.’  Dumbass,” Ja’far mutters.

“It’s not like anyone gave me a handbook,” Sinbad protests, before walking through the entryway and into a larger, open living space.

Instead of replying, Ja’far studies his newest houseguest.  “You’re really sick,” he comments, now that he can see him in the light.  The burn marks on his neck stand out against thin, dehydrated skin.  With his enhanced healing they should be nearly gone by now, but instead they’re just oozing and looking slightly green.  Swollen eyelids and feverishly chapped lips just make his eyes look even more lifeless and dull.  It’s sicker than he’s ever seen a vampire.  “Really, really sick.”  

“I’m aware.”  

“Sit down,” Ja’far commands, pointing to his couch across the room.

Sinbad sits down, and is immediately hit with the fact that he hasn’t sat on comfortable furniture in at least six months.

“Do you still want me to kill you?”  Ja’far asks.

“Not particularly.”

“Then why aren’t you trying to save yourself?”  Ja’far doesn’t know whether to say it, but this creature literally looks on its deathbed.  He’s never seen anything like it, but wouldn’t be surprised if he really would have died in that alley by morning.

“I told you,” Sinbad sighs.  “I don’t want to kill anyone.  I’ve done it before when I wasn’t in control, and I haven’t done it again since.”  

“Which was when?”

“Um, almost five years ago?”  

“No wonder you’re so sick, if you’ve been living off of animals since then.  Even your mutations will only get you so far.”  

“Please don’t remind me.  Thinking about it makes me nauseous.”  

Ja’far doesn’t know what to do with this situation.  “Well, what are you going to do?”

“Don’t know.  Thanks for the couch, though.  Much better than concrete.  Maybe I’ll die in my sleep comfortably.”  

“You really don’t feel any instinct to kill someone at all?”  Ja’far has seen vampires try and fail this same thing before.  It often just made them more vicious, in the end.  The fact that the monster in front of him could quite literally die tomorrow and still isn’t trying to survive goes against everything he’s ever seen or been taught.

“I did a few months ago, when I really did start throwing up animal blood.  But I left before I could give in.  I only wandered back to civilization because I didn’t even feel hungry anymore.  Figured I was dying, and didn’t want to die where no one would find me.”  

“You just...walked away?”

“Hardest thing I’ve ever done, but yes.”  

“What’s your name?”

Sinbad blinks at the change in questioning.  “Sinbad.”  

“Who turned you?”

Sinbad frowns.  “No idea.  Not anything with any humanity left over.  I was a commercial fisherman, and we were docked for the night when it snuck on and took most of the crew out.  Small, confined cabins and all that.  I...killed it.  Messily.  Not sure if it made it into the news or anything, because I don’t remember much after.”  

“I’m Ja’far,” is all Ja’far decides to say in reply.  

“Wish I could say it was a pleasure to meet you.”  

“What would you do if I cut myself?”

“Huh?”  Sinbad struggles to understand the rapid changes in conversation through his exhaustion and foggy thoughts.  

“Could you stop yourself, or would you attack me?”

“I’m not strong enough to attack you, bleeding or otherwise.”

“Do you want to live?”

“Not badly enough to kill.”

“But you do want to live, if you could.”

“Of course.”

There is a moment of pensive silence.  

“Blood type,” Ja’far demands gruffly.

“What?”

“What’s your fucking blood type?”

“Uh… Rural village.  Wasn’t big on doctors.  I don’t remember.”

Ja’far resists smacking his forehead against the wall.  “You must be the world’s shittiest vampire.  How are you even still alive?”  Sinbad frowns and opens his mouth, but Ja’far interrupts him.  “Nevermind, I don’t care.  Doesn’t matter anyway; I’m o-negative.”

“Universal donor, bet the red cross loves you.”

“An unfortunate circumstance, in my occupation.  But good for you.”  Ja’far strips off his jacket, and can’t believe he’s doing what he’s about to.  Despite his best efforts, he can’t convince himself that Sinbad is the monster he wishes he was.  And frankly, Ja’far is impressed he has had the willpower to drive himself to lie pathetically at death’s door.  Ja’far has seen too many former men and women fight and lose this same battle; and some tiny, childish, hopeful part of Ja’far that he didn’t know he still had can’t stand to watch the one man he’s seen win an impossible war die for his victory.  

So Ja’far ignores all his training and yanks the neck of his shirt to the side, exposing a collar bone.  “Here.”

Sinbad stares blankly, and Ja’far tugs at his shirt harder.  “I’m not going to offer twice, so you better take me up on my moment of insanity.”  

“No.  I’m not an idiot.  You’ll either die or turn like I did.”  Which he knows will be an excuse to kill him.  And now that he’s not freezing and miserable in an alleyway, that sounds less appealing.  

Ja’far shakes his head.  “You really don’t know anything, do you?  I’ll be fine; just don’t take too much.”

“What if I can’t stop?”

“I’ll stop you.”

“Can you?”

“Definitely.”  

Sinbad stands up shakily, eyes dilating automatically at the skin being offered to him.  Then he shakes his head, fighting off the impulse.  “You swear you’ll kill me if you have to?”  

Ja’far nods.  “Without hesitation.  I’ve taken down far worse than you.”  He grabs the meat of his shoulder.  “Bite here, not an artery.  It’ll bleed, but slowly.”  

“Why are you doing this?”  Sinbad asks.  “I don’t even know you, and I can tell you’re not an empathetic man.”

“I have no idea, just take advantage of it before I change my mind and revert back to training over instinct.”  

 Sinbad tentatively touches the skin where Ja’far had grabbed, his body practically screaming at the sensation of blood beneath flesh.  “Grab your knives.”

“I can draw them plenty fast.”

“Don’t care,” Sinbad says with the first sign of conviction he’s had all night.  “Have them in your hands.”

Ja’far complies, and Sinbad just stands there, panting for air and trying a last-ditch effort to resist.  

“Go on, do it,” Ja’far goads.  “I’ll kill you before you can kill me.”  

Sinbad takes a deep breath and bites down, his senses abruptly narrowing to the warmth beneath his mouth, and then lighting on fire at the taste of hot, metallic blood on his tongue.  Ja’far hisses slightly at the punctures, and Sinbad bites down a bit harder at the perceived vulnerability before he catches himself and stops.  The blood slowly trickling into his mouth doesn’t feel like nearly enough, and Sinbad has to dig his fingers painfully into his own thighs to resist the urge to just go straight for Ja’far’s neck.  

It’s worth it when he finally manages to get a small mouthful of blood and swallow it down, because his stomach decreases its stabbing pains and his spinning head clears ever so slightly.  The warmth traveling down his throat is heavenly, because for once it doesn’t make him feel like vomiting.  At the first sensation of his stomach being filled, Sinbad finally loses a bit of control, too overcome by his body realizing that what it so desperately needs is right there in front of him.  His vision goes spotty and his jaw closes down harder, and Sinbad barely manages to stuff his hands in his pockets before they reach out to grab Ja’far like some doll to be yanked around and destroyed.  

Ja’far grits his teeth when he feels the bite grow even harder, but realizes it’s probably necessary for blood flow in an area without any critical arteries, and bears it.  He knows how much blood he can lose without too much consequence, and it’s quite a bit more than a mouthful.  Sinbad’s panting breaths near his ear pause for a moment as he swallows again, and Ja’far tries to keep track of how much blood he’s losing.  He’d frankly been ready for Sinbad to go completely mad, but while he’s obviously not in perfect control, he’s managed to keep his hands restrained and his mouth from going anywhere more rewarding, and thus more lethal.  Ja’far tips his head to the side and tries to relax his muscles despite the pain, to encourage greater blood circulation.  He hears a third swallow, and grips his weapons tightly.  

It hurts, it’s frightening, and it’s against everything he knows, but Ja’far can’t convince himself it’s wrong.  Because Sinbad’s body is shaking, but somehow he hasn’t made a serious move to threaten Ja’far, even as he takes his fourth gulp of blood, bigger this time.  Ja’far decides he probably has three more before he’s going to have to stop him.  

Sinbad feels like he’s been in a scorching desert for weeks and has managed to find clear water.  More blood slides down his throat and he wants to cry from relief.  He can’t remember how long he’s needed this, only that he has it now, and sucks hard to get another mouthful.  His vision is black, all he knows is that this is the best he’s felt in recent memory, like a high he wants over and over and over--

Sinbad yanks his head off of Ja’far’s neck with a gasp, knowing he tears the cuts a little deeper and more ragged in his haste, but not caring amidst the sheer force of will it takes to do as much as he does.  He falls to the floor and then immediately scrambles backward on all fours, away from Ja’far and back towards the opposite side of the room.  Once a safer distance away, he wipes at his mouth and takes a few heaves of air before daring to look up at Ja’far.  He has a rag pressed to his neck and looks a bit pained and cautious, but otherwise still alive and functioning, so Sinbad lets himself slump against the wall, eyes wide and definitely panicked at how close he just came to never coming back.

“Are you alright?”  

The words are unexpected, shaking Sinbad out of his imminent meltdown, and he looks up to see dark eyes regarding him with a strange but unreadable expression.  “I will be.”  He takes a few more deep breaths.  “Are _ you  _ alright?” Sinbad asks hesitantly.

“Fine, might get a bit dizzy if I have to run around just yet.”  

“Sorry.”  

Ja’far shakes his head.  “You stopped.”  

“Almost didn’t.”  

“Better than I expected it to go, regardless.”  

“Me too.”  No longer in the heat of the moment, Sinbad feels confident in his restraint again, and relaxes.  He lets his head flop to the side and crosses his wrists loosely over his stomach with a soft groan.

“Indigestion?” Ja’far asks, trying to keep his tone light, like he didn’t just do something against every belief he has had beaten into him for his entire life.

Sinbad shakes his head messily and lets out a noise of content.  “Definitely not.  Feel like I just ate a good meal, had my first sip of water in days, and had fantastic, exhausting sex all at once.”   

“I’ll take it that you feel better, then.”  

“So much better.  I didn’t even know how bad I’d felt until just now.”  Sinbad can feel the warmth in his belly starting to radiate out through the rest of his limbs, and feels like he has control of his muscles for the first time in years.  

Ja’far eyes him critically, lids blinking lazily over golden eyes, greasy hair drifting in his face.  “You look better.  A bit less… dead.”  

“Gee, thanks.”  

“You know what I mean.”  Ja’far pulls the cloth off his neck, finds it still oozing slightly, and puts it back on.  

Sinbad lets his eyes slip closed, concentrating on the new energy thrumming through his body, the way he no longer feels everything aching and every system failing.  “Thank you,” he breathes, tears welling in his eyes.  “Thank you so much.”  

“Are you crying?”

“Thinking about it.  Haven’t decided yet.”  

“Why the hell are you crying?”  Crying is not in the repertoire of emotions Ja’far can deal with. 

“What, I’m not allowed to have feelings?  I was dying for years and now I’m not; it’s a bit much to process.”  Sinbad tries to shake off his dazed and teary state, but fails. “You should try it sometime and see if you can take it with a straight face.”  

“You’re terrible at this.”

“I’m not terrible.”  Sinbad gives up and slides down to the floor.  He really is overwhelmed at all the sensations, and though he feels comparatively fantastic, is still exhausted, if not even more so than he was before.  

“No, you really are.  You’re on the floor again, right back where you started.”  

“Inside and not dying anymore, it’s a definite improvement.”  Sinbad holds back a grateful sob as more and more of his body starts returning to normal function.  The feverish aches had been so much a part of his life that he’d nearly forgotten them, only realizing how painful it was now that they were abating.

“Don’t fucking cry!”  

Sinbad rolls over so his face is to the wall.  “I can’t help it.  Don’t stand there staring like it’s a crime.”

“It’s not a…” Ja’far shakes his head, and finally bothers to kick off his shoes.  “Whatever.  Stay on the ground for all I care.”  Sinbad’s behavior continues to break every rule Ja’far had memorized.  Even as desperate as he had been, feeding hadn’t sent him into a frenzy, nor had it removed his humanity any more than his years of sickness had.  It just wasn’t right.

“At least the ground here is warm,” Sinbad mutters, a bit resentful at being made fun of, tongue sticky in his throat.  

“Such a low bar.”

“Low expectations mean anything less than horrible is great.  This floor is great, and I’m going to sleep.”  

“It’s not anywhere close to morning, don’t sleep.”

“I’m exhausted and finally not horribly ill.  I’m sleeping.  Do away with me if you must.”  

“At least crawl on the couch.”  Ja’far relents when he realizes the cause of Sinbad’s confusion and apparent emotional fragility.  His body obviously has a lot of repair work to do, and true to his species, it’s working fast.  

“I’m allowed not just a room, but a cushion?”

“ _ Now _ the attitude starts?”

Sinbad just makes a sleepy noise.

“Floor, cushion, I don’t care.  But if you destroy anything, anyone, or leave this house, I will personally hunt you down and slaughter you as slowly and painfully as possible.”  

“‘K.”

“And don’t even think about trying to kill me in my sleep.  My room is basically a bunker.  You won’t get in unless I let you.” 

Sinbad flops his foot aimlessly, and Ja’far decides that is as good of a reply as he is going to get.  He locks his door, turns off the lights, and makes his way to his bedroom.  Once inside, he latches several different mechanisms, bolts plates over his windows, reminds himself of his very reinforced walls, brushes his teeth, and tries to crawl into bed.  

Regardless of the (still confounding) fact that he’d brought the thing here himself, Ja’far can’t manage to sleep with a monster in his house.  

After well over an hour, complete silence, and no sign of attack, Ja’far finally gives up.  He digs under his bed, takes out a glass bottle, and drinks as much as he can before making a face at the unpleasant burning and corking it back up.  Perhaps not the healthiest coping mechanism, but it’s yet to fail him.  Within twenty minutes his eyes are drooping, and Ja’far falls into a restless sleep.  


	2. Two

He wakes up the next morning still tired (he always is), but definitely still alive.  Ja’far listens at the door for any signs of movement, checks for evidence of entry, fiddles for a while longer, then decides he might as well leave his room and face what might be the greatest mistake he’s made in his life.  

It’s not a very intimidating mistake, because Sinbad had managed to crawl onto the couch overnight, and he’s still sprawled out in a way that looks painful, sound asleep.  

He looks markedly less ill, if also quite a bit more stupid.  His face is slack, his hair messy, his limbs sprawled illogically and in a way he clearly did not control.  But his breaths are longer and deeper, his skin less fragile, body less brittle, and in general he looks softer, warmer, and healthier.

And also more dangerous for it, though it’s a bit hard to reconcile when he’s passed out on the couch like a college frat boy after a night of drinking.

Ja’far stands staring for a little longer, brain wandering aimlessly before he notices.  He’s never helped someone heal before, only ever killed; or put someone out of their misery, at best.  It’s strangely fulfilling, making someone who’d looked that dead start to appear human again.  

Ja’far makes a disgusted noise and shakes his head, stomping over to his kitchen to turn on the coffee pot.  It must be far too early if he’s mistaking monsters for humans.  He doesn’t try to be quiet as he bangs around the kitchen, frying an egg for toast before pouring a mug of dense, sludgy coffee.  Ja’far sits down at the counter, strains to reach his laptop on the other side, and then flips it open to frown at as he eats his breakfast, occasionally squinting over the top of the screen to cast a distasteful look in Sinbad’s direction.  

After nearly an hour, one of Ja’far’s cautious glances is met with Sinbad’s own.

“Morning.”  

Ja’far looks up at the greeting, then back down.

“Rude.”  Sinbad stretches, and then pulls himself upright on the couch.  “Thanks anyway, though.  That was the best I’ve slept in years.”  

“It’s not even noon, yet.  Go back to sleep.”

“Nah, I’m up.  When you’re awake, you’re awake.  I’ll just avoid the light as best I can.”  Sinbad puts his feet on the ground, stands, and sighs.  “It’s so nice to stand up and not immediately want to fall over again.”  

“You’re lucky you heal so quickly.  It would take humans weeks to recover from what you did in a night.”  

“I know that.  You seem to think I wasn’t human once.”  

“Doesn’t matter what you were, only what you are.”

“That’s mean.  What if I had a family waiting for me?  They would still love me.”

“You don’t?”

“No,” Sinbad mutters.  “They’re dead.”

“Oh.  Well, you wouldn’t be the first.”  Ja’far replies.

“What?”  It takes Sinbad a moment to realize that Ja’far thinks he killed his family.  “No, no!  They were gone long before this happened.”

“Small mercies.”

“I guess.”  Sinbad walks over to the counter and tries to peer at Ja’far’s laptop screen, which is immediately hidden from his view.  He huffs, but gives up.  “I hate to ask more from you, but do you have any more eggs?”

Ja’far pinches his eyebrows together.  “Yes, I do.”

“Can I have a couple?”  

“For what?”  

“Eating, obviously.  What do you think I’m going to do, throw them at you?”  

“You want breakfast?”

“I’m hungry, so yes, if you can spare the food.”  

“And eggs are going to work for that?”  Ja’far asks.  

“Or toast, or bacon, or whatever.  But your eggs smelled good.”  

“...sure.  Knock yourself out.”  

“Sweet, thanks.”  Sinbad examines the pan still sitting on the stove, wipes it out briefly with a paper towel, and then shuffles around until he finds butter and eggs, summarily cracking them and dropping them in the pan with a sizzle.  He can sense Ja’far watching him, but decides not to comment.  It is his home, after all.

Finally, Ja’far’s consternation and curiosity gets the best of him.  “You eat eggs?”

Sinbad turns his head over his shoulder to look at Ja’far in concern.  “Am I not supposed to?”  

“Uh.  You eat blood.”

“Yeah, but I also eat everything else.  Do you know how much blood I’d have to consume just to fulfill my caloric needs?” 

“I thought you didn’t know anything about this.”

“I don’t.  I just hated pig’s blood, and so ate as little of it as possible.  Obviously it wasn’t good enough, because it still made me sick in the end.  But I wasn’t going to live off the stuff when I could get most of what I needed from regular food.”  

Ja’far doesn’t quite know what he’s dealing with, having admittedly never done in-depth research on the few vampires he knows manage to live normally without turning bloodthirsty.  It hadn’t been pertinent, when all he’d hunted were the worst, most dangerous ones.  “You figured that out on your own?”

Sinbad pokes at his eggs and flips them.  “I mean at first I thought it was like a substance addiction or something, and if I could just stop I’d be fine.  But I got sicker and sicker, and so I went to animal blood before I lost control and went for humans.  It was bad, but it fixed it at first.  Pigs were the best, but after a while, nothing worked.”  

“Poisoning.”

“Hm?”

“It has what you need, but also things that poison you.  Just like if you consume too much of the wrong blood type.”

“Oh, that’s why you asked, before.  I guess that makes as much sense as anything else.”  

“But you don’t drink blood because you’re hungry?” Ja’far seeks clarification.

“It’s not…” Sinbad frowns, and pauses to put eggs on his plate.  “It’s different.”  He rummages for a fork before sitting down across from Ja’far, planting his elbows on the counter.  “It’s more like… scurvy!  That’s close.  Except instead of being sick and just  _ knowing  _ that citrus would make you better, it’s being sick and  _ feeling  _ that blood is what is going to make you better.  Like your whole body knows and craves that specifically.”  

“But you need a lot.” 

“I… don’t know.  I haven’t been the picture of health, obviously.  But I never wanted more than a couple mouthfuls of animal blood.  That may have just been how disgusting it was, though.”  

“A lot of vampires can drain an entire person, if not more.”  

“I mean, it tastes good.”  Sinbad’s eyes flick nervously to Ja’far’s neck and then back to his food, and he shoves a bite of egg forcefully into his mouth.  “ _ I’d _ live off of it if I could, but that would require a lot more blood than anyone is willing to give.”  

“If it’s that simple, why do vampires kill at all?”  As far as Ja’far can tell, if they only need a few mouthfuls then most should be able to find someone willing to give it.  

Sinbad shrugs.  “What I want and what I  _ need  _ are two very different things.  I _ wanted  _ to suck the life out of you.  Obviously that wasn’t what I needed to get better.”  

“Do you want that now?”

“To drain you dry, for lack of a better term?”

“Yes.”

“Uh, yeah.  I mean I don’t, because you helped me out and don’t seem like too bad of a guy, but my body wants to, you know?”  

“All the time?”

“Basically.  I just try not to think about it.  It’s like when you have an itch in your shoe, and the more you think about it, the worse it gets.  But if you stop thinking about it then it isn’t that bad.”

“How much do you need, to not live like that?”  Ja’far dreads the answer.

“I’m not sure I want to know.  I would guess a lot, based upon what you seem to think my eating habits should be.”    

“But how much do you need to survive?”

Sinbad shrugs.  “Not a lot, hopefully.  I mean I went five years without human blood.”  

“You were days, if not hours, from dying.”  

“And yet here I am.”  

Ja’far pokes aimlessly at the remnants of cold egg on his plate.  “Are you always this nonchalant about death?  I’m serious when I say I’ve  _ never  _ seen a monster lie down and die like you were.  Didn’t matter how sick they were.  I don’t even see humans do that, very often.”  

“Dunno; wasn’t worried about it, and never have been.  I’ve seen enough to know that sometimes it’s merciful, sometimes it’s painful, but it comes for both the deserving and undeserving in the end.  Why worry about it?  I’m meant for more, apparently.”  

“‘Meant,’” Ja’far snorts.  “As if there’s anything out there putting meaning to this.”  

“You never know,” Sinbad shovels the last of his food into his mouth and waves his fork for emphasis.  “Don’t count anything out.  I was ready to die until you apparently had a complete change of heart and decided to help me.  That was a higher something or other at work, even if that something or other was just your suppressed humanity.”  

“Forgive me for not feeling bad for every blood-sucking, murderous monster I see.”  

“I don’t do that.”

“I’m not sure.  I’m not willing to accept that you’re the one exception to a rule that’s been true for centuries.”  

“Maybe it’s been true for centuries because you’re getting a biased sample.  Or shoot first and ask questions later,” Sinbad mutters.  

“I tend to not have time to question things intent on killing me.”  

“Hey, I didn’t say it was a bad policy, generally speaking.  Gotta do what you gotta do.  It’s just that if you’d jumped on me six months ago, I’d have been strong enough to fight back, and you’d have killed me.  Makes me wonder how many others get killed just because they’re trying to defend themselves.  There might be more than you think.”  

“Have you met any more like you?”

“Nope.  Only various other creatures intent on driving me from their territory.”  

“See?” Ja’far can’t help but keep a bit of vindication in his voice at proving his point.

Sinbad shrugs.  “Well if I hadn’t turned violent so fast when I first turned, I would have been able to continue living normally.  In which case I wouldn’t exactly go out and announce my presence to the world.  With hunters and other monsters out there, hiding has always been the way I survived.  I imagine others do the same.”  

“You weren’t doing a very good job, seeing as I managed to sense you even as weak as you were.”  Ja’far decides a subject change is preferable to arguing about his life philosophy and losing.

“True enough.  How did you do that, by the way?  Hunters usually have to track me, and I don’t get found often because I don’t kill people.  You seemed like you could feel it, just like I can when others are nearby.”  Sinbad tilts his head.  “You a witch, or something?  One of those found me pretty fast, once.”  

Ja’far makes a face.  “Definitely not.”

Sinbad squints at him.  “You don’t look like any of the half-breeds I’ve seen.  But I suppose I probably haven’t seen them all.”  

“Disgusting.”

“You know,” Sinbad points his fork at Ja’far, “the way you talk sometimes makes me feel a lot like the way I did when I’d always get stopped for ‘random’ checks at the airport.  Why’d it be so bad to be half a monster?  It’s not like they asked for it.  By your standards I’m a whole monster, and I didn’t ask for it either.”

“Are you seriously calling me a racist right now?”

“Yeah, I am.  I think.”  He isn’t quite sure vampirism counts as a race.

Ja’far stands up and sets his plate and mug in the sink with a rattle.  “You don’t know a damn thing.  You’d be dead if it weren’t for me.”  

Sinbad realizes now might not be the best time for an ethical argument, considering he’s rather dependent on, and indebted to, Ja’far.  “It’s not like I don’t understand the fear.  A vampire killed most of my crew and then nearly killed me; I saw it, and it wasn’t pretty.  I don’t blame you.”  

Ja’far replies with silence.

“...So?  How’d you do it?”  He’s unwilling to be entirely dissuaded from his questioning.

“None of your business.”  

“What, trade secret?”  

Ja’far doesn’t deign to answer.

“You’re not very sociable, are you?”  

“Don’t push it.”

“Fine, fine,” Sinbad relents, turning away with a roll of his eyes.  

Ja’far keeps a scowl on his face and returns to staring at his laptop, but privately can’t help but marvel at how quickly Sinbad has taken on the persona of a completely normal human being.  Even beyond that, he is far too trusting in a situation he shouldn’t be, despite having apparently suffered his fair share of enmity.  And if he’s to be believed, he’s had little positive social interaction for years, yet has taken to chattering away at Ja’far until even his considerable paranoia is lured into the smallest modicum of security.  Ja’far doesn’t know whether it’s a testament to his resilience, an inherent optimism, or something insidiously treacherous.  Training tells him to act upon the latter possibility.  

“Wash your dishes,” is all he mutters in response.  

“Give me a little credit; my mother taught me better than to make a mess in a stranger’s home.”  

“Then it’s her that deserves the credit, not you.”

“Oi,” Sinbad protests, but goes about cleaning up anyway.  Upon finishing, he stands in the middle of the worn kitchen floor, fidgeting with the matted ends of his own hair.  “Not to infringe further upon your…..hospitality,” Sinbad says, after a strained minute.  “But do you think I could take a shower?  I’m kind of…”

“Filthy.”

“Yep.”

“You weren’t bothered before.”

“I had bigger priorities, before.  Don’t tell me  _ you _ like going to bed all sticky and gross.”  The state of his apartment tells him Ja’far is clinically clean.  As does the fact that he’d had his face practically buried in Ja’far’s hair and even his over-sensitive nose hadn’t smelled anything at all.  

“Fine.  Just don’t break anything.”  

“If I’ve gotten this far, I think I can take a shower without breaking any bones.”  

“I didn’t mean bones, I meant the shower.  Feel free to break yourself as much as you like, just nothing of mine.”

Sinbad just shakes his head, sighs, and trudges off to the bathroom.  

Half an hour later and just as Ja’far is debating whether Sinbad has been gone too long and needs to be monitored, Ja’far hears bare feet step out of the bathroom, and barely resists looking up.  No use giving Sinbad the advantage of knowing just how off-putting his presence is.  

“You don’t happen to have a blow drier, do you?”  

“And why the hell would I have that?”  Still focused on anything but the other person in the room.

“For blowing things dry, as the name implies.”  

Ja’far raises his eyebrows.  Improved quality of life seems to be lending Sinbad more attitude, which doesn’t bode well for his survival.  If he provides too much resistance, Ja’far is unwilling to take the chance of having him so close to home.  It would be far from the first time he’d hidden a body.  “The atmosphere will do just as well.  It has a lot of practice with evaporation.”  

“Yeah, maybe if I leave it alone for the next five hours.”  There’s a distinct note of whining in his voice.  

“I’ve got a pair of scissors.  That would probably do the job.”  

Sinbad blanches and tangles a hand into the towel wrapped around his head.  “I think not.”

“Don’t complain about it, then.”  Ja’far returns to frowning at his computer, conversation ended.  

“What are you clicking at?  Do you at least have a brush I could borrow?”

Conversation apparently not ended; something that seems to be an emerging pattern with his unwelcome housemate.  Ja’far doesn’t bother to answer the first question, pausing in his work only long enough to hold up his fingers and wiggle them demonstratively.  “You’ve got as much of a brush as I do.”  

Sinbad makes a noise of complaint.  “You seriously don’t even have a comb?”  

“All my belongings can fit into my truck.”

“I’m pretty sure a comb would fit too.  They’re not very big.”  

“Beggars can’t be choosers.  Stop bitching.”  

“So mean.  Can’t a man care about his looks?”  

“No, there are better things to care about.  And put on a shirt.”

“But mine is dirty, and I don’t think I’d fit in yours.”  

“Nor would I lend you one.  But I put yours in the washer, and it should be dry by now.”

“Oh.  Um, thanks.”  Sinbad makes to move towards the hallway where he thinks he saw a washer and dryer, but blinks and shudders uncomfortably as he steps into the light slanting in through a window.  “See, this is why I thought the door thing was true.  Sunlight and silver still hurt me.”

“Those are physiological reactions,” Ja’far states.  “Of course they hurt you.  I don’t know who started the door thing.”  

“Probably the Catholics,” Sinbad decides.

Ja’far fights to restrain any sign of amusement, the snide comment catching him by surprise.  “Probably.”  

“Can I eat garlic, though?”

This time, Ja’far does snort out a short breath of amusement, though he immediately regrets the display of any sort of emotion in front of such a threat.  “Yes.  You can eat garlic.”

“Oh thank god.  Can’t believe I’ve been avoiding Italian food all this time for nothing.”  No matter that he already know garlic didn’t effect him; it had been worth it for the moment of vulnerability the jibe had gotten from his...benefactor?  Captor?  Sinbad still isn’t quite sure.

He edges carefully around the pool of sunlight, emerging with his shirt and grumbling as he tugs it over wet hair.  Task completed, he stands in the kitchen entryway and fidgets, picking up various items, inspecting them, and putting them back down.

“I’m going to go take a nap,” Ja’far announces, though whether he’ll be able to get any sleep at all is debatable.  At the very least, he can get some personal space.  “If you do anything--”

“I know, I know.”  Sinbad thumps his own hand into his chest, accompanied by a gruesome squishing noise.  “Stake through the heart.”  

“That’s not how you kill a vampire.”

“No?  I imagine it would still work, though I guess there are more efficient methods.”  

“You’d be surprised how many things keep moving even with their hearts ripped out,” Ja’far says, a slightly menacing growl starting in the back of his throat.  

Sinbad senses the attempt at intimidation, but decides not to react.  He plops down into a sturdy but worn chair that is tucked into the corner of the small living space.  “As long as I’m not one of them, I think you can rest easy.  I can go to the hardware store and get you a couple fence posts, if that would make you feel better.”  

“Shut up before I make you.”  

A sly grin as Sinbad leans back in his chair is the first hint Ja’far gets that he has made a mistake.  

“Sounds fun, I’m game.”  

Ja’far covers up an instinctive fluster with a disgusted noise, barely restraining the urge to spit.  “Do you get off on having your life threatened?  Because it’s about to become more than a threat.”

The other man feigns thoughtfulness.  “Not sure; it’s become a bit commonplace for me, these last couple years, having my life threatened.  But I’m willing to try and find out, if you are,” he answers with a truly egregious wink. 

“Ugh.”  Deciding discretion might be the better part of valor, at this point, Ja’far stomps off to his room, making sure to audibly slam the bolts home behind him.  

* * *

 

Much to Ja’far’s chagrin, getting Sinbad out of his home is not as easy as he had previously assumed.  The only person he could realistically pawn him off on without any questions isn’t answering the phone, and Ja’far is too proud to ask anyone else for help, or even let them know he’s put himself into this predicament.  Anyone safe enough to tell would never let him hear the end of it, and Ja’far decides that at least for another few days, he’d rather put up with a hungry vampire than a blow to his pride.  

The third time Sinbad manages to yank himself off of Ja’far without killing him, it’s easier.  This time, however, there’s a noticeable side effect.  “Uh, sorry,” Sinbad laughs nervously.  “What a time to regain my sex drive,” he mumbles, wiping at his mouth.

“What?”

“Oh, um, nothing.”

“No, what did you say?”

“Nothing I’m going to say again if you didn’t notice in the first place.”  

Ja’far glares.  “If you have any intention of killing me, you’re not going to live through it.”

“Trust me, nothing of the sort.”

“Trust is something you’re never going to get from me.”

Sinbad shrugs.  “Suit yourself.  

“I’ve seriously got to find you someplace else to stay,” Ja’far grumbles.  

Sinbad ruffles his hair and laughs, quickly dodging the slap this earns him.  “A little company would do you good.”

“Unlikely, if it’s yours.”

“Ouch.”


	3. Three

Ja’far nearly cries from relief when he makes one last desperate call and gets an answer.  “Where have you  _ been _ ?” he demands.

“Ja’far?  I’ve been in Nevada.  Backcountry, last minute, you know how those things go.  Are you ok?  Why do I have so many missed calls from you?”  The feminine voice on the other end inquires, questions rapidfire.  

“Long story.  I have….company.”  

“Company you need my license to kill?” she says, resignation clear in her voice.  

“Not exactly.  Though the longer I’m in his presence, the more I wish I could put a bullet in his brain.”

“You feel that way about everyone.”

“Please just let me bring him over,” Ja’far pleads, try not to sound too desperate.  “I need  _ space _ .”  

There is a sound on the other end that could be a cough or a poorly disguised chuckle.  “So you want to pawn him off on me?”

“Precisely.  You know me well.”  

“I make no promises.  But I can meet you around eleven, is that alright?”  

“Perfect.”  

“Alright, see you then, I guess.  I shouldn’t be prepared for anything too catastrophic, should I?”  

“Not unless dick jokes require armed countermeasures,” Ja’far growls, making it clear he thinks they deserve exactly that.

“I’ll take that under advisement.”  

With only a small amount of fussing, Ja’far does manage to wrangle Sinbad into his pickup.  He only gets a few serial killer comments from Sinbad as they get farther into the woods outside of town, but they’re mostly to fill the awkward silence.  Ja’far drives like he’s running from someone, and Sinbad is all too eager to get out of the truck as soon as it parks up a winding driveway, a sign ominously labeling it as a county undertaker.  Before his feet have even hit the ground, a door slams and a rather short woman comes scampering out, giving a cursory glance to Ja’far before planting her feet and holding her hand out in front of Sinbad.

“Nice to meet you.  I’m Yamuraiha”  Yamuraiha shakes his hand, regards him with sharp and calculating eyes.   Before he even gets a word in edgewise, she immediately pulls at his lips, eyeing teeth and gums, and Sinbad is too startled to pull away.  “I’m surprised Ja’far let you live.  You’re well fed.”  

Sinbad frowns down at the tiny woman prodding at him, a bit baffled by her complete lack of fear.  “That doesn’t appear to bother you, though.  And I’m uh, Sinbad.”  

“Oh, sorry.  Yes.  Sinbad.”  She suddenly seems to remember herself.  “I’m so sorry!  Let’s um, go inside.”  Yamuraiha promptly turns on her heel, ears reddening slightly, and turns back towards the building she’d come from.  It’s old and colonial, white with black shutters, and Sinbad can see a series of outbuildings in the back.  

“She’s a bit excitable,” Ja’far supplies.

“So I’ve noticed.”  

The inside is a bit cluttered but clean, odd jars and dried substances hanging amidst large stacks of books and fluffed rugs.  “This is….not exactly how I pictured the inside of a morgue.”  

“Oh.  No, I live here.  Work stuff is out back,” Yamuraiha points a thumb in the described direction.  She shuffles into the kitchen and puts a kettle on, clearly using the movement to keep her hands occupied.  “So what’s your story, Sinbad?  I already know Ja’far’s.”  

“Uh, I’m a vampire?”  

“Clearly.  But how did you end up here?”  

“Don’t take this the wrong way, but I’m not sure I should really say.”  

She flaps her hand dismissively, pushing teacups over the counter towards him and Ja’far.  “Don’t worry about it.  I’ve seen people make all sorts of conditions work.  Blood banks, using convicted murders for food, black market trades, you name it.  Just because you all have a variety of different needs doesn’t mean there aren’t ways to make it work.”  She stares pointedly at Ja’far.  “It’s not always all or nothing.”  

“Don’t look at me,” Ja’far glares.  “You know I only go after the really bad ones.”

“Which is why I’m surprised he’s alive.”  Yamuraiha jerks a thumb at Sinbad.  “I assume he must have a rather creative solution to get past you.”  

“He wasn’t planned, I just stumbled onto him.”

“Yes, I was a bit put off,” Sinbad mutters.  “Just drifted into town and someone jumps on me in a dark alley.”  

“It was reflex,” Ja’far explains, a bit shamefaced.  “I shouldn’t have done it.”  

Yamuraiha shrugs.  “You’re better than you used to be.”  She looks back at Sinbad.  “So what  _ do  _ you do?  Couldn’t have been easy to talk Ja’far down.”    

“Ah, animals mostly.”  Sinbad rubs at the back of his head.

“Sure,” Yamuraiha replies, sarcasm heavy in her voice.  “I’ve seen that before.  Don’t look half so good as you do.”  

“Oh, you mean now.”  Sinbad points to Ja’far.  “Ja’far has been helping me.”  

“Yes, I gathered.  But by doing what?”  

Sinbad furrows his brows in confusion.  “Giving me blood?”  

Yamuraiha sighs in exasperation.  “But where is he getting it?  Is he doing something he shouldn’t?  Maybe I don’t want to know.”  

Ja’far opens his mouth to answer but Sinbad beats him to it.  “I mean, presumably it comes from his bone marrow.  I’m pretty sure that’s how it works.”  

Yamuraiha whips her head to Ja’far in surprise.  “You?  No way.”  

Ja’far’s face flushes and his mouth closes with a slight click as he casts his eyes to the floor.  “He was in really bad shape,” he mutters.  “I felt bad for him.”  

“ _ You  _ felt bad for a  _ vampire _ ,” she states more than asks, clearly in disbelief.  

He still refuses to meet her eyes.  “I’d never seen one get that sick without losing it.  He was going to die or go feral.  I was.... impressed.”  

“Got some humanity left after all, do you?  I always told you so,” Yamuraiha says with a smirk.

Jafar scowls and flips her off.  

“Oh don't be like that.  You know I never cared what you were.”. 

Sinbad raises his eyebrows and looks between them curiously, sensing something he doesn't understand is being discussed.  Quick to try and smooth over the awkward moment until he can address it at a later date, Sinbad jumps into the conversation.  “So uh, what are you, Yamuraiha?  You look pretty…”

“Human?  I am.  I’m a….sorceress, I suppose, would be the polite word.”  

“She’s a witch,” Ja’far supplies.

“I am  _ not _ .  That’s rude and you know it, Ja’far.”  

“I’m a rude person.”

“Yes you are.  You’d gone so soft for a moment, I’d nearly forgotten.”

Sinbad doesn’t think he’s ever seen something so closely resembling a  _ pout  _ on Ja’far’s face in the brief time he had known him.  It vanishes as quickly as it came.  

“So, uh, magic and medicine,” Sinbad supplies, eager to move past the odd moment.  “Not a usual combination.”

“It’s not magic so much as….it’s hard to explain.  And it has more in common with science than one might think.”  

“I’ll take your word for it.”  Ja’far continues to sulk, so Sinbad makes another effort to fill the silence.  “You’re a doctor though?”

“Medical examiner.”

He points to a diploma on the wall.  Ja’far might think him a fool, but he decides being observant might get him onto Yamuraiha’s good side faster than not.  “Went to med school.”

“Yes, and if anyone got wind of the fact that I was practicing on live patients instead of dead ones, I would not like the consequences.”  

“Well if lore is to be believed, I’m half alive at best.”

Yamuraiha laughs lightly, in spite of the strange situation.  “Entirely alive, in my opinion.”  

“Professional or personal?” he asks with a crooked smile.

“Both.  Nothing like working in a morgue to make you familiar with what death looks like.  You’re not it.”  

“You should have seen him last week,” Ja’far mutters.  “Put him on a cold steel slab and you’d be hard-pressed to tell the difference from a corpse.”  

Sinbad sighs and lets his shoulders drop.  “I feel  _ so  _ much better now.  I’d felt sick for so long I forgot how bad it was.”  

“And how long was that?”

Sinbad bites his lip.  “A little over five years?”  

Yamuraiha raises her eyebrows.  “You really  _ were  _ about to lose it.  I don’t think I’ve seen anyone go that long before.”  

“Don’t think so,” Sinbad disagrees.  “I was… the first few weeks weren’t good.  I don’t remember them well, but I wasn’t eager to repeat it.  And I definitely wasn’t creeping towards that mindset, again.  I just felt really tired.”  

“He was dying,” Ja’far admits.  Sinbad looks at him curiously, and Ja’far pretends he doesn’t see.  “I’d never seen anyone look that bad, and I’ve watched so many lose that fight.  You know how hard it is to watch,” he tries to justify, looking to Yamuraiha.  “Sinbad was the first one I ever saw win, but he was dying for it.  I couldn’t let that effort go to waste.”  

There is a knock on a back door from somewhere farther into the house, and Ja’far flinches to upright alertness.  

“Expecting someone?” Sinbad asks, even as Ja’far mutters a quick “we should go.”  

Yamuraiha waves her hand dismissively.  “Nonsense, Ja’far; it’s just Hinahoho’s family.  Rurumu and the kids would love to see you, I’m sure.  And you can introduce them to your new….friend.”  

Ja’far, if it was even possible, manages to grow paler.  “Ah, no, I really wouldn’t want to impose.”  

Sinbad barely catches a mischievous gleam in her blue eyes before it’s gone again.  

“No such thing.  If I can feed  _ them _ , adding you two will barely be a drop in the bucket.”  

Yamuraiha moves to answer the door, and Ja’far immediately takes a defensive stance.  Sinbad only has a moment to ponder this strange action carefully backing up against the wall to avoid the imminent beam of sunlight, before there is a shriek of delight and pounding footsteps.  

“Walk, kids!” scolds a woman.

“Inside voices!” shouts a man, rather voiding his own command.  

“Jafa!” cries a chorus of childish voices, and there is an ominous thump as Ja’far is tackled and hits the ground hard.  

“Oh!  Hello, Ja’far.  I didn’t know you were in town, or we would have told you.”  

Sinbad has to crane his neck up to regard the woman who has entered the house and just spoken.  She is ducking slightly, attempting to keep her head from hitting the ceiling.  “Woah.”  

Not yet noticed, his murmur goes unanswered as the woman bends down to pluck two children -- for that is what they are, no matter they are nearly the size of a grown man -- off of Ja’far’s prone form.  The man grabs the remaining boy by the scruff of his neck, hoisting him playfully into the air, and finally freeing Ja’far.  Sinbad spots a child with a gangly preteen look about him, peering eagerly around the adults, though trying to hide his curiosity.  

Ja’far sits up, dusting himself off and attempting to straighten his shirt.  “Hello, Rurumu.  Hinahoho.  Entourage.”   

The large man, who Sinbad assumes to be Hinahoho, bends down to help Ja’far up.  “Curb your enthusiasm, why don’t you?  We thought you were still in Montana!”  

“Just got back last week,” Ja’far mutters, looking anywhere but at Sinbad.  Sinbad doesn’t know if it’s because he doesn’t want to make the introduction, or he’s ashamed of being taken down by a gaggle of children.  Large children, certainly, but children nonetheless.  

“A phone call, next time.  We worry about you,” is the gentle chide this receives.  Finally, the children take notice of Sinbad and start pointing, prompting a greeting.  “And who is this?”  

Sinbad steps away from the wall, still gingerly avoiding the pools of sunlight not quite blocked out by the impressive silhouettes in the doorway.  “Uh, I’m Sinbad.”  

“New here?”  Gentle eyes appraise him, not quite fitting for the rather threatening power of the woman who owns them.  

“Yeah.  Ja’far dragged me in last week.”  

“Did he, now?”  There is a definite mischievous twinkle in those eyes now, and Sinbad tries to avoid the glare he is receiving from Ja’far.  He’s saved by a large hand clapping him on the shoulder, which children nearly as tall as himself seem to take as invitation to begin investigating him.  

“Welcome to town, then!” booms the large man.  “I’m Hinahoho, this is my beautiful wife, Rurumu; you’ve already met Ja’far, and these are the rest of our children.”  He lists them off in quick succession, and Sinbad only catches half of their names.  Sinbad isn’t accustomed to feeling physically small, but he certainly feels it now.  His entire hand fits in the palm of the one he is currently shaking.   He is still so distracted by puzzling over the sheer  _ size  _ of these people (a healthy dose of  _ how on earth does anyone keep something like this a secret _ running through his mind) that it takes him a long moment to realize that Ja’far seems to be included in the list of children.  By the time he’s formed enough thought to phrase it as a question, Hinahoho and Rurumu are already shuffling plates of prepared food onto Yamuraiha’s counter, and the opportunity has passed.  He looks to Ja’far instead, but can’t manage to meet his eyes, as Ja’far’s attention is occupied by two twin girls, chattering away at him in a language Sinbad doesn’t even recognize, let alone understand.  

Over the course of a rather lively dinner it becomes apparent that Ja’far is, indeed, considered part of this family.  Which is odd, from what Sinbad has gathered of his temperament, but the kids do seem to genuinely adore him.  He still refuses to so much as look at Sinbad, which he finds equal parts amusing and off-putting.  Sinbad misses his own family enough to be a somewhat bitter, that Ja’far seems to take this one without much gratitude, but decides not to press.  There are enough teasing allusions to embarrassing teenage tantrums to lead Sinbad to believe Ja’far’s quiet, reticent act is a notable improvement.  And really, if anyone should be able to handle Ja’far’s fits of violent rage with nothing but a rueful chuckle, it  _ would  _ be a bunch of northern giants.  

It’s hard not to get caught up in the rambunctious atmosphere, and before anyone knows it, kids are nodding off, and guests are excusing themselves.  

Which leaves Sinbad in a bit of an odd predicament.  

“Stop trying to pawn off your houseguest,” Rurumu scolds Ja’far, when he gives her one last whispered comment and she tries to shoo her family out the front door.  “You know better than to make people feel unwelcome.”

“But--”

“I taught you better than this!  And after everything Yamuraiha has done for all of us, don’t even think of trying to throw more work onto her.  Some company will do you good, until we find him a place.”  She turns a teasing smile upon Sinbad.  “He really needs to get out more.”  

 “Oh good, he can stay with you, Ja’far.  I don’t exactly have much room here.  Unless you’re interested in a refrigerated drawer, Sinbad.”  

Sinbad laughs nervously.  “Ah, no thanks.  I think I’ll take my chances.”  

With a final wave, the last of the jotunn leave the house, and a moment of silence reigns. 

“I’m joking,” Yamuraiha says with a smile.  

“I was hoping so, but I haven’t quite caught onto the humor of the undead, yet.  And don’t take this the wrong way, but you don’t exactly look the type for, uh….”

“Cutting up dead bodies?”  

“Yeah.  That.  Or dealing with monsters.  Or anything in that vein, really.”  

“I can handle myself,” she answers with a huff.  “And someone has to take care of you all.”  

“Something which seems best done from a hospital,” he points out.  Plus Yamuraiha strikes him as someone who would enjoy healing more than dealing with death and decay.

“Too public.  Besides, I get to do more private research, here.”  

“In a morgue.”

“Just as clean as any other medical facility.  Besides,” she gestures to the rows of stainless steel drawers along the walls, “Access to lots of things.  Brains, livers, skin, hearts….blood.”  

“Ah.  Bit of a side business,” Sinbad deduces.  

She shakes her head.  “Not as such.  This city is….friendly, to people with different needs.  It’s mutually beneficial.  It’s  _ fascinating,  _ how many different types of people there are.”  The gleam in her eyes is a bit alarming, but Sinbad decides not to point it out.  “There are a few others like me, around here.”  

“None of them willing to tolerate me,” Ja’far interjects.  

“And can you blame them?  You barged in here like a bloody dervish.  We’ve worked hard to keep everything quiet, and you nearly ruined it.”  

“You guys don’t exactly put up signs,” he grumbles resentfully.

“And if we did, would it have stopped you?”

He glowers.  “Not me, nor any others who could sense just how many monstrosities are wandering around here.”  

The petite woman glares right back, clearly unimpressed with Ja’far’s choice of language.  “Lucky for use you took care of that for us then, aren’t we?”  

There is the slightest flinch and Ja’far backs down, and Sinbad makes note of that for later consideration.  Ja’far is proving to have a more than touchy temper, but he hasn’t seen that particular reaction before.  

“Let’s go home, Sin.”

Sinbad raises an eyebrow at the new moniker, but obediently turns to leave, pausing to give Yamuraiha a friendly wave and a quick “thank you,” since Ja’far certainly isn’t going to.  


	4. Four

Sinbad awakens to a raucous banging on the front door.  

“Ja’far!” comes muffled through the apartment intercom, “Ja’far, I know you’re in there!  Please let me in, my dad is going to kill me if I don’t find some place to hide in the next, like, thirty minutes.”

Sinbad snorts at the distinct note of pleading in the voice.  It’s not nearly loud enough to be one of the jotunn, and he hasn’t met  anyone else brave enough, or stupid enough, to approach Ja’far about personal issues.  

“Come on,” the stranger continues, now ringing the bell obnoxiously.  “You  _ know  _ you owe me one.”  

When the onslaught doesn’t cease and Ja’far doesn’t emerge, Sinbad swings his feet onto the floor, runs a hand through his hair, and tromps over to the door.  The man on the other side nearly falls into the hall as he opens it, and then looks up with a completely bewildered expression on his face.

“Uh.”  Dark eyes widen as he peers up at Sinbad’s face.  “Did...did the guy who lived here move?  God, I’m sorry.  I must look insane, if you could just tell me where--”

Sinbad decides to save him from his embarrassment.  “Ja’far’s still here.  He’s just throwing a tantrum and hiding in his room.”  

“I am  _ not _ throwing a tantrum.”  By way of announcing his presence, Ja’far stomps around the corner.  “Mystras, what on earth are you doing here?”  

“Exactly what I said I was doing here!  Dad is seriously going to kill me, this time!” 

“Don’t be so overdramatic.  I’ve had one hell of a day, and don’t have the patience.”

Sinbad almost mentions not knowing Ja’far had patience to lose in the first place, but holds his tongue.  

“It’s not  _ over _ dramatic if it’s true!”

Ja’far sighs, resigned.  “Fine, come in.”  He immediately turns on his heel and stalks back into the house.  

Mystras gives Sinbad one more curious look, then slips around him and hurriedly closes the door.  He flops down on one of the kitchen stools, and regards Sinbad’s impromptu nest on the couch with something bordering on amazement.  “Did you like, lose your job, Ja’far?”

“What?  No.  How do you lose a freelance job?”  

He looks to the couch again, then between Sinbad and Ja’far.  “I mean, there’s a strange man sleeping on your couch.  Even Vittel doesn’t get to sleep in your house.  You’ve never needed a roommate for rent, before.”  

“Less of a roommate, more of a freeloader,” Ja’far grouches, dumping water into the coffee machine.  

“You  _ hate  _ hunting partners,” Mystras continues, words a rushed jumble.  “And I would know if there was a new one in town, at least if he was good enough for  _ you  _ to tolerate.  Who is this guy?  Is something wrong?  Should I get--”  

Ja’far drops a heavy pan into the sink with a resounding clang, and Sinbad feels his shoulders drop slightly as the torrent of questions stops in its tracks.  “If you would  _ stop talking for twenty seconds _ , maybe we could get somewhere with this conversation without you panicking.”  

Mystras closes his eyes and takes a deep breath to collect himself, before opening them again and swinging his legs off the stool, more composed.  “Sorry.  First thing’s first, before I start begging.”  He jerks a thumb at Sinbad.  “Who’s this guy?”  

“‘This guy’ is right here,” Sinbad grumbles, unaccustomed to being discussed while still in the room.  “And I’m Sinbad.”

“Like...the sailor?”  

He shrugs.  “Dad was a fisherman.  He liked the story.”  

“Fair enough, I guess.”  Mystras’s feet thunk against the cabinets beneath the counter.  “What are you guys after?  Usually the hunting families get notified when someone new comes into town.”  

“Should I have made a public announcement?  Seems unwise.”  

“We’ve got a lot of rules, here.  Don’t want zealots upsetting the balance, right Ja’far?” he asks with a note of teasing.  

“I don’t want to hear it from the Leoxses reject.  And Sinbad isn’t a hunter, anyway.”  

Sinbad plants his elbows on the counter, attempting to blow his bangs out of his face.  How this new interloper manages to stand the hair dangling in his eyes, he doesn’t now.  “Are there rules about monsters being hunters?  Though I don’t have much of a stomach for killing, I’ll admit, so I probably wouldn’t be much good, anyway.”  

“Ha!”  Mystras forces a laugh.  “Good one.  Seriously though, I’ve never heard of you.  Must be impressive if Ja’far tolerates you.”  

“I think he just keeps me because I’m pretty,” Sinbad jokes.  

Mystras nods in fake solemnity, and says in a stage whisper.  “I did always suspect he batted for the other team.”  

“Does he?  I was beginning to doubt myself; usually my innuendos at least get me a pity chuckle, but all Ja’far does is glare at me.”

Ja’far glares at him.

“See?  Just like that.”  

“I think the fact that you’re still alive means you might have a chance.”  

Sinbad can see Ja’far’s ears growing red, a sure sign of his impending outburst.  “That’s good news.  I was starting to think all those movies about vampires seducing their victims had led me wrong.”  

The explosion finally arrives, in the form of a kitchen knife held to Sinbad’s eye.  “Sinbad, if you don’t shut the fuck up, I  _ can  _ and  _ will kill you _ .”  

Sinbad blinks at the impromptu weapon, and decides that with another witness present, now is the time to start calling these bluffs.  “Like I’ve said, make sure it’s with a stake through the heart and ends in me buried in an iron cage.  I’d hate to besmirch perfectly good legends with death-by-fillet-knife.”  

Ja’far holds the knife to his face for one more tense moment, face red, jaw clenched and knuckles white with rage.  Then he turns abruptly with an animalistic growl, flinging the knife to land hilt-deep in the drywall of the living room, a bit crumbling onto the carpet below.    

Mystras coughs nervously in the deafening silence that follows.  

“I can patch that,” Sinbad says with forced levity.  

Ja’far ignores them both, turning to pull a new knife out of the block, leaving the previous one quivering in the wall.  

“I’d say I should go, but I’m kind of still in fear of my life,” Mystras mumbles.  “Or my hide and dignity, at the very least.”  He chews on his lip.  “Ja’far doesn’t respond well to monster jokes.  Or uh, any jokes at all, I think.”  

Sinbad sighs and shakes his head.  “I’ve gathered.  No joke, though.  I really do want to go down in style, if I must.”  He turns to give Mystras a sharply fanged grin.  “Ja’far won’t do it, so make sure my last will and testament has that written down, if I wind up in a ditch one day soon.”  

“You’d deserve it,” Ja’far turns around long enough to spit in his direction.  

Mystras stares wide-eyed at Sinbad’s mouth for an uncomfortably long time.  “You’re  _ shitting me _ ,” he finally manages to breath.  

“If they were fake I’d have pulled them out a long time ago,” Sinbad says.  

After one more moment of shocked silence, the first thing Mystras does is yank his phone out of his pocket.  “I’ve got to tell everyone.”  He immediately starts tapping away.

“Mystras dont you fucking--”

An ominous swoosh rings throughout the room as the message sends.  “Too late.”  

Ja’far snatches for the phone but Mystras keeps it out of his reach.  “Who did you just send that to?  I’ll fucking  _ murder you _ .”  

“No you won’t.”  

Ja’far lunges for his phone again, and Mystras dances out of the way with a grace Sinbad had not assumed he possessed, by the way he carried himself. 

“You came here to ask for a favor?  I’m not inclined to give it,” Ja’far threatens, bouncing on his toes and gauging his next move.

“Aw come on Ja’far, you know we wouldn’t do this to you if you weren’t so easy to rile up.”  

Ja’far reaches into a kitchen drawer and brandishes a small handgun.  “Try me.”  

Mystras rolls his eyes, and Sinbad takes note that he isn’t the only one to observe that much of Ja’far’s anger is just for show.  “It’s just Drakon, Ja’far.  The only person he’ll tell is his wife.”  

“That is two people two many.”

“You know, Ja’far, I’m starting to get a bit hurt that maintaining your bitchy reputation is more important than letting me meet people.  I’m not  _ that  _ embarrassing, and if you want me out of your house, that’s not going to happen unless I make some connections.”  He turns to Mystras.  “Maybe he just wants to keep me all to himself.”

Ja’far’s response is a blank-faced stare, and Mystras stares too for a moment, before letting out a guffaw of laughter.  

“Do you, or do you not want to ask a favor, Mystras?  You’re not ingratiating yourself.”

“Maybe you’re right, Sinbad,” Mystras says instead of answering.  “He’s not even yelling this time.”  

“Maybe I’ve just given up,” Ja’far retorts. “Get out of my house.”

Sinbad is not keen to be alone in Ja’far’s moody company once more, and he truly is getting sick of him trying to push people away.  “At least ask what’s wrong, Ja’far.  Be polite.”

“Sinbad, I will--”

“Whatever you are about to say is probably not polite.  Don’t make me call your mom.”  Not that he has her number, but he’s pretty sure he can find it.  Assuming Ja’far doesn’t inflict grievous bodily harm, first.  

Ja’far splutters for a moment, then stills.  “What’s wrong,” he manages to grit out through his teeth, voice barely monotone.  

Mystras does his best to restrain his laughter, but knows it comes out in his eyes.  “Spartos got caught at school with some tree nymph or something, and naturally it’s my fault,” the man complains.

“What?”  

“We’ve got a population of them here,” Mystras explains.  “Matriarchal tree-huggers.  Cute like blonde disney princesses, until you try to tell them what to do.”  

“Sounds….interesting.”  

“I’d say that’s his own fault,” Ja’far argues, kicking Mytras’s shoes into the hallway and off the carpet.  “And they’re not that bad.  They just don’t like your family.”

“Yeah, but I can’t  _ say  _ that!”

“Why not?”

“I’m not going to throw my baby brother under the bus!  Plus he’s younger, and such a rule follower, so dad thinks it must be me who corrupted him.”  

“Maybe it’s just his shitty parenting,” Ja’far suggests.

“Hey!  I mean you’re right, but that’s still my family.”  

“I thought that sort of thing was like….ok, living here,” Sinbad inserts, hesitant to involve himself in such an emotional outburst.  

Mystras huffs.  “You know how traditional families can be.  It’s all fine and good when someone  _ else _ does it, but as soon as it’s your kid, it’s an embarrassment.”  

“Ah, so I’ve been told.  And you family are….?”

“Hunters.  Of the nearly monastic kind, and have been for centuries.  I, uh, don’t fit the mold.”  

Sinbad can’t help but laugh.  “I can tell.  Which is a compliment, I think.”  

“I’ll take it as one.”

“Unfortunately, the couch is already taken,” Ja’far interrupts.  

“So I see.  And I’d hate to interrupt a budding romance.”  

“ _ Mystras!! I’m going to fucking--”   _

“Murder me?  You’ve never been very good at that, honestly.  At least not compared to how often you say it.”  He pauses to wink at Sinbad.  “Keep that in mind.”  

“Just save yourself,” Sinbad replies.  “Leave me to my fate, I volunteer as a sacrifice so that you can run.”  

Mystras hops off the stool amidst Ja’far’s grumbling and Sinbad’s barely restrained laughter.  “Off to invade the newlyweds it is, then.  Oh, the glares Drakon will give me.  Pray for my soul.”

“Only if you return the favor,” Sinbad half-jokes.  
“Nice to meet you!  I’m sure I’ll be seeing you around.”  

“Anytime.  As lovely as the company is, it’s nice to have a break.”  

Ja’far glowers.  “Get out, Mystras.  You’re encouraging him.  And tell Drakon to delete that fucking text before Saher sees it and the entire town knows!”  

Mystras scurries to the door, gives Sinbad a wink, and snipes a parting shot: “Probably way too late, already!”


	5. Five

Sinbad was initially glad when Ja’far finally started letting him tag along on his various nighttime escapades; having never done well sitting still, and being far too curious to let Ja’far just go about his business without constant wheedling and questions.  Unfortunately, these trips are generally not as exciting as Sinbad had hoped; lots of sitting, waiting, and watching, with very little action.   

Tonight, he is taking back every complaint of boredom he’d ever made, as he finds himself bowled over into the mud, head ringing with the impact, wrists clamped to the ground by a set of rather impressive claws.  He looks up into nearly luminous red eyes, slavering jaws, and pinches his eyes shut, waiting for the inevitable.  When nothing happens after a few moments, he slits one eye open.  Nothing about his predicament has changed, but that in and of itself is a surprise and a blessing.  There is an alien coldness in the eyes above him, but despite sharp teeth and sharper claws, they aren’t malicious.  If anything, the gaze he finds himself under is….apathetic.  

“Um, can I help you?” he offers after more silence.

The only response he gets is a grumbling huff of hot, moist air into his face.  

“No, I don’t suppose you can talk, looking like that,” Sinbad agrees.  At least he thinks he agrees; he isn’t entirely sure anything was said at all. 

After perhaps thirty more seconds of calm, his captor stiffens, ears darting back, an instant before Ja’far comes bursting out of the bushes.  Eyes slit, face blank, armed to the teeth, Sinbad tries to stop him with a call of his name.  Ja’far’s eyes only slide over him without any recognition.  

“Don’t!” Sinbad yells, but it’s met with the same lack of response as before.  

The werewolf above him growls, teeth bared, but doesn’t make a move even as Ja’far begins a downward slash with his knife.  In a last-ditch effort, Sinbad yanks his right arm as hard as he can, muscles burning and a pulsing pain lighting up behind his eyes.  Suddenly his hand is free, and he reaches out just in time to grab Ja’far by the ankle and drag him down into the mud with him, successfully stopping his knife mid-swing.  It doesn’t stop him for long, and Sinbad cries out and releases the captured ankle as Ja’far buries a knife in Sinbad’s bicep with a sickening parting of flesh.  It is only a matter of seconds before a burning pain is lancing through his veins, a knife plunging towards his throat, and Sinbad sees little but flashes of red and white as his head spins.  

When his vision clears, he’s on his feet, the werewolf is nowhere to be seen, and neither is Ja’far.  Sinbad wipes at his eyes and his hand comes up bloody.  Further inspection leads him to conclude this is also why his vision is still blurred, his nose is running, and his ears are wet.  He shudders to think where else he might be leaking blood.  The sound of creaking wood makes him whip his head to the right, and he sees Ja’far crumpled against the side of a large pine, the trunk of the tree dangerously close to toppling, held together by only a few splinters.    Before he can take more than half a dozen steps in Ja’far’s direction (and really, the trajectory between Sinbad and Ja’far’s crash site makes it all too clear how he got there), Sinbad passes out once more.  

He next finds himself sitting in the torn-up clearing, Ja’far with a growing welt on his head and passed out on his thigh, and a gangly, nude teenager sitting in the mud a couple yards away, blinking stolidly.

“Well,” Sinbad summarizes, unsure of how his situation has altered slightly from his last memory, “that was fun.”  

No one responds.

Sinbad wipes at his eyes once more, this time managing to pick dried blood out of them.  “Lovely.”  He turns to the only other conscious occupant of the clearing.  “Did you move us?”

There is no reply but a blink that may be an agreement, or may simply be coincidence.

“I’m Sinbad,” he supplies, by way of greeting, though it sounds more like an attempt at an explanation.  He gestures to the man in his lap.  “And this is Ja’far.  Or I think it is.  He’s certainly got a temper on him, but I’ve never seen him act like that, before.”  

“Masrur,” the boy grunts.

“Pardon?”

“I’m Masrur.”

“Oh.  Nice to meet you, I suppose.  Though it could have been under better circumstances.”

He gets only a brief nod in response, before red eyes are upon Ja’far breathing shallowly in his lap.  “Possession.”  

“Come again?”

The boy’s nose twitches in what might be the barest hint of frustration, the first sign of emotion Sinbad has seen since his transformation.  A muddied hand, nails clipped short, unlike the claws that had previously occupied it, points to Ja’far.  “That was a possession.”  

Sinbad scoffs.  “I’ve never met someone less likely to contract with a demon in my life.”  

Broad shoulders shrug, and Sinbad can’t help but be grateful he met this particular creature now, rather than a few years down the line.  His bone structure marks him out as having the potential to cut a rather intimidating figure, once he fills out.  

“Should I like, tie him up, or something?”  Sinbad knows he was lucky to catch Ja’far how he did.  If he comes back to the waking world with more sense and a bit less rage, he might not be so fortunate a second time.  

“Why are you asking me?”  It’s worded as a question, but there’s little inflection in the voice.  

“You thought he was possessed, so I hoped you’d know what state he’ll be in when he wakes.  I doubt it’s a demon, but something wasn’t right, and Ja’far is scary even when he’s in control.  If he thinks we took him out, he’ll be even scarier.”  

Nostrils flare, and Masrur’s lips part slightly as he inhales.  “Old spellwork.  Not corrupted enough to be broken, so he’ll be sensible when he wakes.”  

Sinbad frowns, unsure whether to believe him.  “That does not guarantee our safety, trust me.”  

As if responding to the very notion of being restrained, Ja’far starts shifting.  A bit panicked, Sinbad slaps a hand around his wrists.  Ja’far shifts, freezes, and then one eye cracks open.  

“ _ What  _ are you doing?”  

“Aha, well, you see….”  

“Release me.”  

“Are you planning on stabbing me again?”  

“Only if you don’t let me go in the next ten seconds.”

Sinbad lets go of Ja’far’s wrists, allowing him to sit up, noticing a wince he fails to entirely conceal.  “Glad to see you’re back to your inconsiderate self.”  

There is a question clear in Ja’far’s eyes, but then they shift away, and Ja’far stands, rubbing absently at his head, and he doesn’t ask it.  Not that Sinbad expected he would, but he was hoping for some sort of explanation, even if it was dismissive and rude.  He resolves to demand as much later, at a more convenient time.  

“Let’s go.”  Ja’far interrupts his thoughts.  

“Got room for one more?”

Ja’far turns to look at Sinbad, clearly ready to snap at him, and finally seems to take notice of the boy still sitting quietly on the ground.  He starts, hides it well as a limp, but Sinbad sees it.

“And we really should get that head injury checked out.  It’s unlike you not to notice an entire person not twenty feet away.”  

“I’m fine.”

“My ass.  Well, actually that is plenty fine, but--”

Ja’far spits a glob of bloody saliva into the dirt.  

“Yeah, yeah.  You ever heard of trying to lighten up a bad situation?  Didn’t think so.”  He turns around to invite Masrur himself, since Ja’far clearly won’t.  “Come on, kid.  Let’s at least find you some clothes and a meal for the night.”  

“Sin, I will not have a  _ werewolf in my truck--” _

“He pulled you out of a crushed tree while I was passed out.  The least you could do is give him a ride.  We’re going to go get you checked for a concussion, at least.”  He makes no comment on the fact that Ja’far shouldn’t even be walking, by the looks of the crater he left.  Another piece of information filed away for later, as Sinbad builds a case for interrogation as soon as he and Ja’far are in private again.  

Two hours later finds them outside of the morgue again, just as the sun is starting to peek above the surrounding trees.  A few knocks gets them a response, but no open door.  

“Come in,” Yamuraiha calls.  

Ja’far frowns curiously, but pushes the door open.  

Sinbad has barely closed the door behind them when there’s an irate and decidedly masculine yell from down the hallway.  “Who are you screeching at, you hag?”  

“No one who wants anything to do with you, you drunken fop!” is the retaliating cry from the direction of the kitchen.  

There’s a thud and a curious dragging sound from the hall.  “I’m not the one who brought a handle of whiskey to movie night you--ack!”  

Sinbad barely has time to register that a man - bronzed skin, bare chested - has come into the living room before he is gone again, darting back around the corner with a panicked look on his face.  

“I think it’s a bit too late to hide, after that entrance,” Ja’far grumbles, just loud enough that his voice carries.  

A sheepishly grinning face pops around the corner.  “Aha, hello Ja’far.”  He glances nervously to Sinbad.  “And, uh, friend.  Didn’t know he had any of those.”  Slitted green eyes dart back to Ja’far.  “Please don’t kill him, Ja’far.  I don’t think he saw anything.”  Back to Sinbad.  “You didn’t see anything, right?”  

Sinbad blinks at the rapid onslaught.  “Uh--”  

“It’s fine, Sharrkan,” Ja’far interrupts with a roll of his eyes.  “Sinbad’s safe, I’m not going to do anything to him.”  

“Not that he hasn’t tried.”  Noticing the other man still seems reluctant to emerge, and assuming, from previous experience, it’s to hide some sort of odd morphology, he gives a friendly wave and grins, fangs sliding out of his gums.  

“Ah,” he says, understanding crossing his features.  “Ok.”  

The reason for the odd gait and noise becomes apparent as a man’s torso emerges back into the room, followed by….the rear half of a very, very large snake.  

“Sharrkan, where are your clothes?” Ja’far says with a sigh, clearly resisting the urge to pinch the bridge of his nose.  

“Uh…” he glances back in the direction of Yamuraiha’s bedroom.  “They’re around.”  

Ja’far just shakes his head in resignation, and Sinbad peers in the direction Sharrkan had been looking, sudden realization dawning.  He looks to Sharrkan, the odd, nervous way scales coil and slide upon the floor, then down the hall, then back to the man in front of him.  “Oh.  Woah.  Uhm...how does that even….” he joins Ja’far in shaking his head.  “You know, nevermind.  None of my business.”  

A lascivious grin slides over Sharrkan’s face.  “If you  _ must  _ know--”

“Sharrkan, don’t you dare!”  Yamuraiha emerges from the kitchen, mug in hand.  

“He asked!” he argues.

“He  _ said _ nevermind!  Like a decent and polite human being!”

Ja’far snorts.  “As if.”  

“I can be very polite, Ja’far!”

“Yeah, when you want something.”  

Sinbad decides that point isn’t worth arguing, and swiftly changes the subject.  “Granted.  And, um, can I just take a moment to address the snake-mermaid in the room, if no one else is going to?”  

“Naga.”

“What?”

“I’m a naga, not a….snake mermaid.”  He scrunches his nose distastefully.  

“Oops, sorry.  I’m new at this.”

Yamuraiha comes to his rescue.  “Sharrkan, this is Sinbad.  Sinbad, Sharrkan.”  

“Hello!” Sinbad waves once more before reaching out to shake hands.  

“Uh, hi.”  Sharrkan returns the gesture.  “Sorry about earlier, you look more….”

“Normal?”

“Yeah.  More than me, at least.  And I mean, some humans are fine, but you’re new and…”

“No offense taken.  We’re the ones barging in covered in grime, so early in the morning.  We just need Ja’far stitched up, and we’ll be on our way.”  

“Ah, should have known.  Ja’far rarely make social calls, and Yamu  _ is  _ very good with her hands.”  

Suddenly Yamuraiha’s mug of coffee spilled.  Upward.  Into Sharrkan’s face.  

“Ouch, you bestial woman!  That’s hot, you know!”  

“I’m sorry,” she replied primly.  “Must have slipped.”

“Slipped, my ass.  Last I checked coffee doesn’t spill against the flow of gravity.”  

“You  _ can  _ do magic,” Sinbad feels the need to point out, not bothering to hide his fascination at the display of power.  He knew there had to be more to her than scalpels and a quick wit, for how incautiously she seemed to regard all manner of creatures traipsing through her home and workplace. 

Yamuraiha grimaces.  “After a fashion.  It’s not something I like to use for frivolity.”  

“Says the woman who just used it to boil my face!”  

“A just cause,” she sniffs.  

“Ah, it does make me feel a bit better, though,” Sinbad interrupts, a note of relief in his voice.  

“That sounds distinctly like you’re about to ask me for a favor much more dangerous than a few stitches.”

“Knew you were smart.”  Sinbad puts on his best winning smile, and Yamuraiha grimaces.  

“Werewolf in my truck,” Ja’far states, not in the mood to beat around the bush like he knows Sinbad will.  He’s tired, in pain, and intent on avoiding the questions he had seen burning in Sinbad’s eyes for the entire drive here.  “You’ve got a month to find a way to contain him.”  

“You just….left him outside?” 

“He pretty much goes where I tell him.”  Sinbad shrugs.  “Besides, he’s young and alone now.  Given his nature, I’d hate to say he looks like a bit like a lost puppy, but, well….that’s about exactly what he looks like.”  

“Alone?  Meaning you…”

“Killed them,” Ja’far confirms.  “Six adults.”  

Yamuraiha frowns, but nods decisively.  “For the best.”  

Sinbad is surprised to hear that from her, but Sharrkan interrupts before he can question Yamuraiha about the uncharacteristic acceptance of violence.  

“Where’d they come from?”  This is clearly directed at Ja’far.  “I thought the Leoxses and Rens drove the last of them out of the county years ago.”  

Ja’far gives a noncommittal shrug.  “If they had any inkling lycanthropy was spreading, I’d be the last person they’d tell.  Ask your brother, he’s much more in the loop than I am.”  

Sharrkan shrinks visibly.  “Low blow, man.”  

“It’s true, though.”  

Sinbad files this away to ask later, as well.  Clearly the politics of the underground in this city are more complex than his current understanding.  “So…” he attempts in an unconvincing segue, “why are we ok with killing werewolves?”  

“They’re dangerous,” Ja’far answers, short and unsatisfactory as usual.  

“We’re all dangerous, according to you.”  Sinbad can’t help but think of the silent kid sitting in the back of Ja’far’s pickup, the way he’d pinned Sinbad to the ground and just stared, stared, stared.  He wasn’t especially sociable, but neither was he malicious.  If anything, the lack of enthusiasm in such a young person was a bit...sad, really.  

“They’re almost impossible to control,” Yamuraiha steps in to explain.  “I’ve met a few self-policing packs, but they almost all end violently.  The longer they have the virus, the more violent they get, when they turn.”  

“And stronger,” Sharrkan adds.  “The Rens tried to keep one, a decade or so back.  Cousin got infected, or something; they’re not very open about it.  Blew the door off a bank vault and killed half their family before someone stopped it.”  

“Their own fault,” Ja’far grunts.  “Any decent hunter who contracts lycanthropy blows their own head off.”  

“It’s a shame, really,” Yamuraiha continues, with a distasteful glance at Ja’far.  “Perfectly normal for twenty-seven days, then rabid enough to kill a village for one night.”  

“Masrur seems alright,” Sinbad argues, feeling distinctly outnumbered.  “Even transformed, he didn’t do anything to me.”  

“You said he’s young?  Give him time.”  

“Shut up, Ja’far.  He’s just a kid.”  

Ja’far actually pauses with his mouth half open, blinking.  Sinbad doesn’t know how many more times direct confrontation will work towards keeping Ja’far quiet, but he takes note of it, anyway.  

“Please, Yamuraiha?”  he wheedles.  “Just a month.  See if there isn’t something to be done.  If not, I’ll...um, take care of it.  I guess.”  The thought does not thrill him.  

She rubs a finger back and forth between her eyebrows, sighing.  “Fine.  I can make some calls, maybe give me more time to work on something permanent.  If this goes wrong, though, I’m blaming you.”  

“Only fair.”  Sinbad decides to take a chance and throw in one last, convincing carrot.  “Just think of what you could do for everyone if you  _ did  _ find a cure.  Or even just a stopgap.”  

Yamuraiha’s eyes immediately light up, and he can already see the ideas whizzing behind their blue surface.  He hears Ja’far sigh in resignation.  

“Oh now you’ve gone and done it,” grumbles Sharrkan.  

* * *

 


	6. Six

Ja’far seems determined to ignore the entire previous evening, something Sinbad is not about to let slide, in light of his near-demise.  He flops down on the couch and scrubs at his eyes, then stares long enough to force Ja’far to look at him.

“I think you owe me an explanation.”  His tone brooks no argument.  

“I don’t owe you a damn thing.”  

“Masrur said you were possessed.”  

“And you know I’d never do that, certainly not in the middle of a fight.”

Sinbad raises an accusing finger at him.  “So you do admit something was off, with that fight.”  

“My life was threatened, forgive me a little bloodlust.”  

“That was a bit more than bloodlust, Ja’far.  I know you think I’m a fool, but I’m not exactly blind.”  Far from it, in the dark, which brings him to a realization.  “Speaking of which, you have rather excellent night vision for a human.”  

“Amazing what giving your eyes time to adjust can do.”

“You’re a shitty liar,” Sinbad grumbles.  

“I’ve never made a deal with a demon, so how would I be possessed?”  Ja’far stops picking the mud off his boots long enough to level a steely gaze at Sinbad.  “And do you  _ really  _ think I’d stoop so low?”  

“And when evasion fails, you go straight to aggression,” Sinbad observes.  “I don’t know a damn thing about you, Ja’far.  I can’t see you making a deal  _ now _ , but it’s old magic.  I don’t know  _ what  _ you would have done in the past, since no one seems to know you before the last five years.”  

“That’s because it’s none of their fucking business!  Or yours, for that matter.”  

“It  _ became  _ my business when you tried to chop my fucking head off with no provocation!  I hit you hard enough to take down the tree you flew into, and all you got was a little bump!”  

“No one is stopping you from leaving, if that bothers you,” he growls.  

“You’re the one always threatening to kill me if I go out of your sight!”  

“And now I’m telling you to get out!  I’m sure  _ someone  _ can find you a place to stay.”  

Ja’far is contradicting himself, running out of steam, and Sinbad can tell.  He’s been watching Ja’far long enough to suspect that his anger is more defensive habit than anything, like a brightly colored snake threatening poison should anything get too close.  But unlike a cornered animal, fighting Ja’far is just going to give him the fuel he needs to get angrier.  Sinbad forces his posture to relax, and tips his head back to avoid Ja’far’s eyes.  

“If you weren’t so busy trying to scare everyone off, you’d realize they care about you.  I’ve seen them forgive a lot worse than whatever you may or may not be, and I haven’t even been around that long.  You’re not stupid, Ja’far.  You think Yamuraiha doesn’t know something is different?  You think Rurumu doesn’t know you’re a little sturdier than the average human?  Her kids aren’t exactly delicate playmates.  I doubt I’m the first to notice.”  Perhaps just the first to say anything.

“And who gave you the right to go gossiping about my past?  You think I don’t have a bad enough reputation already, without you digging around?”  

“I don’t have to gossip.  People who care for you have been pretending they don’t notice for years, because they know it bothers you.  And if you weren’t so busy wrapping yourself in self-loathing, you’d see that.”  

“Then if I owe anyone an explanation, it’s them, not you!”  

Sinbad can hear the desperation clinging to the edges of Ja’far’s anger, and resists looking up at him.  “You don’t have to tell me your whole past.  I just need to know what I’m dealing with, so I don’t get caught by surprise again.”  

There is a stilted pause before Ja’far replies.

“Hunting anything solo is ill-advised.”  

Ja’far’s voice has lost its angry edge, or indeed any emotionality at all, and Sinbad finally picks his head up off the back of the couch to look at him.  His expression is as flat at his voice.  “And yet you are quite vocal about not wanting company,” Sinbad encourages.  

“As you said, you almost got your head chopped off.  My reasons for working alone should be apparent.”  

“You’re not the first to try and kill me.  If sensing monsters is part of this….whatever it is, then it’s not so odd you’d see me as a threat.”  Sinbad knows he has changed tack from confrontational to gentle quickly, but Ja’far doesn’t seem to care.  “If you were with another human, it’d be easier.”  

“It has nothing to do with you being what you are, and everything to do with me being near a monster and you being something that moves.  It doesn’t matter what you are; if you’re alive, I’m going to make you dead.”  

“You know that’s not true.  I’ve seen you fight with plenty of discernment, before.”  

“Until my life is threatened.”  

“And then you become...possessed?”  He’s hesitant to put it that way, since Ja’far did not respond favorably to the accusation before, but he doesn’t know another way to say it.  

“I never made a deal with a demon.”

“I didn’t say you did.  I survived you once, Ja’far, I’m stronger than I look.”  But it was mostly luck, and one look at Ja’far tells Sinbad that he knows it.  

“You’re at half-strength, at best.  And I was made to kill things a lot stronger than you.”  

“Made?”  

There is the tiniest twitch at the corners of Ja’far’s eyes, the only sign of emotion on an otherwise implacable mask.  “I never made a deal,” he reiterates, “minor demons were imprinted upon me when I was very young.  A little bit stronger, a little bit faster, a little bit sturdier, and all the senses needed to hunt down the enemy.  It is not an arrangement without cost.  Even the best tools crack under enough pressure.”  

“No one is making you fight.”  It seems like the fastest way out of that predicament to Sinbad.  

Ja’far shrugs, apathetic.  “It’s just what I do.”

“Other than accounting.”

His jibe gets no reaction.

“Nothing you can do to prevent it?”  

“Clobbering me over the head seemed to work pretty well.”  

Sinbad only has to half-feign a smile.  “Anytime.”  He has a hundred questions burning at the tip of his tongue, but true to his word, he doesn’t ask them.

Ja’far abandons his dirty boots on the table, something he’d never normally do, and makes towards his room.  “Goodnight, Sin.”  

Sinbad doesn’t even have time to say goodnight in turn before the bolts on Ja’far’s door click closed.

* * *

The seventh time Sinbad gingerly digs his teeth into Ja’far’s neck, Ja’far does finally notice the less than respectable side effect, and immediately tenses.  Sinbad takes that as his cue to stop, though he doesn’t know why Ja’far is suddenly so nervous, and pulls his teeth out, gently licking and sucking over the wound to encourage its healing, despite not taking even half of what he usually does.  Ja’far shoves him off before he can finish.

“Sorry,” Sinbad says, though he’s not quite sure what for.  He doesn’t really care, with how warm, dazed, and satiated he feels.  

“Uh,” is Ja’far’s articulate reply.  He looks at Sinbad, then pointedly to his groin.

“Oh.  You just noticed that?  Sorry for that, too.  I keep hoping it’ll stop, but I think it’s just a reflex to having a working body again.  I used to have quite the libido, though I kind of forgot.  I’ll keep farther away, next time, so it’s less awkward.”  He motions lazily to Ja’far’s still-oozing neck, having been pushed off before he could fix it completely.  “At least let me get that.”  

“I heal fast on my own.”

“Yeah, but--”

Ja’far lurches up and mashes his mouth painfully against Sinbad’s, and it takes him a few seconds and a hand fisting in his hair before he tries to pull back with a noise of surprise.  Before he can quite figure out how to react, Ja’far is in his lap, bony knees digging into his hips.  

“Um, ok.”  Sinbad tries to stall so he can understand what’s happening.  “Not quite sure where this-- ack!  What are you doing?”  He bats at Ja’far’s hand that is trying to work its way into his pants.  

Ja’far just growls in frustration, tiring of trying to get under a stiff waistband, and shoves at Sinbad’s shoulders to get him to lie down.  Sinbad doesn’t resist, if only because the only way he knows how might end up with too much force behind it, and he’s not interested in causing broken bones.  Ja’far sits on top of Sinbad’s hips, rolling against them and feeling the obvious erection through his clothes.  He bends down to try and bite at Sinbad’s lips, but Sinbad finally decides he’s had enough and brings a hand up to grab his chin hard.  “What the hell is this?”  

“Trying to have sex, obviously.”

“Were you planning on asking me at any point?”

“No.  What’s to ask?  You’re not going to turn me down.”  

“You don’t think we should talk about this?”

“No.”  

Ja’far jams his own fingers in quickly, one after another and far too fast to be comfortable.  He scrunches his face and bites his lip as he wiggles them around, clearly not enjoying the process.  Before Sinbad can formulate a more viable plan of action, Ja’far has his shoulders pinned back to the floor and is sitting down hard on his cock.  

Sinbad grunts at the uncomfortable tightness, even if it is plenty slick, but doesn’t get any relief before Ja’far is riding his hips up and down, hard and fast.  He doesn’t look like he’s having any fun, and Sinbad knows it doesn’t even feel good to him, too much friction too quickly, so it must be downright painful for Ja’far.  

“Ja’far, slow down.”  

He gets no reply, except for eyes kept determinedly shut.  

“Seriously, stop for a second.”  

When he gets no response again, Sinbad decides that this has gone too far, and it’s time to stop letting Ja’far push him around just out of fear.  He pulls Ja’far’s hands off of his shoulders and sits up forcefully, grabbing at his upper arms to hold him still.  “Ja’far, stop!”  

Large, dark eyes snap open and land on him, nearly animalistic in some sort of terror and fury, and then slide away again.

“What on earth are you doing?”  Sinbad asks, distressed.  He loosens his grip and slides his hands up and down Ja’far’s arms.

Ja’far slaps his hands off.  “Don’t touch me.”

“You practically attacked me without giving me any reason and I can’t even touch you?  That doesn’t seem fair.”

“You could have stopped me if you really wanted to.”  

“Sure, but I would have hurt you.  And I’m not opposed, in theory.”  Men are usually abandoned in favor of how much simpler it is to find interested women, but Sinbad would have to be blind not to notice the way Ja’far tends to look at him when his back is turned, and Sinbad has been far from subtle in his flirtations, even if they were meant half in jest.  

“Then why’d you stop me?” Ja’far spits.

“Because that felt good to neither of us.”  He ignores Ja’far’s previous demands and slides hands down to the middle of his back, rubbing his thumbs in little circles.  “Just slow down.  I know it’s been a while, but I still remember what to do.”  More or less, at least.  No sense in bringing up his relative inexperience with men, at this point.

Ja’far tries to pry Sinbad’s hands off again, but fails against his strength.  “I said don’t touch me!”

“Why?  You already jumped ahead and shoved my cock up your ass; I’m just trying to make you comfortable.”  

“Let me go,” Ja’far tries to wiggle free once more.  “I just want to get this over with.”  

Sinbad frowns in confusion, and then finally gains an inkling of what’s happening.  Instead of complying to Ja’far’s demands, he wraps his arms around his back and tugs him tight against his chest, ignoring protests and struggles.  Just like he hadn’t earnestly tried to stop Ja’far, Ja’far isn’t truly trying to stop him now.  It’s a bit strange, but this entire situation was strange, and Ja’far clearly isn’t open to communicating his wants and dislikes like a normal person.  Sinbad keeps one arm holding Ja’far tight, and runs the other hand up and down his back in an attempt to soothe.  Finally Ja’far gives up on his angry screeching and struggling, and goes still.  

“Not so bad, right?”

Ja’far makes an angry noise next to his ear.  

Sinbad trails his hand down over Ja’far’s hips and lower back, massaging and squeezing, and then works it between their bodies to thumb delicately over a hip bone before dragging it lower and stroking gently over Ja’far’s fading erection.  When he gets no protests after a few minutes of this, Sinbad finally lets his other arm go, brings both hands to Ja’far’s hips to drag them close, and rolls gently against him, rubbing Ja’far’s cock along his belly.  

“It’s ok for you to want someone, Ja’far.”

“I know, that’s why I was just getting on with it.”

“There’s a lot more to wanting someone than ‘getting on with it,’” Sinbad sighs.  

“Maybe if you were another person, but you aren’t.”

Sinbad tries to ignore how that stings in favor of dealing with the more pressing issue.  “People like to be touched and coddled; it’s validating.  I’m all for rough sex on occasion, but this is not such an occasion.”  

“Don’t tell me what I do or don’t want.”

“I’m not telling, just….suggesting?  I don’t enjoy the feeling of chafing.”  

“Fuck you.”

“You were sure trying.”  

Ja’far growls in the back of his throat, and Sinbad tips his head up to kiss him in response.  All this earns him is a savage bite to his lip and Ja’far’s ragged fingernails digging painfully into his ribs.   _ Fine _ , Sinbad thinks,  _ if that’s how he wants it _ .  He tugs Ja’far tight to his chest and rolls them over, effectively pinning Ja’far to the bed, even as his limbs flail in protest.  Sinbad pauses long enough to pin one wrist out to the side, but leaves the other free, and then grins before kissing Ja’far again and giving a retaliatory bite.  Hot metal bursts in his mouth, and it’s all Sinbad can do to keep his actions affectionate rather than giving over to the purely predatory.  Ja’far might want to pretend this is an irrational, passionate act; but actually making it one would be dangerous.  Quite possibly more for Sinbad than Ja’far.  

But he would be lying, if he said Ja’far doesn’t come rather close to losing a few chunks of flesh, simply because they  _ taste good _ .  

In response to the bite, Ja’far’s knees squeeze his waist hard enough to strain Sinbad’s breathing, and the restrained hand snaps around his wrist hard enough that Sinbad can feel his bones grinding together.   _ Fine.  Two can play at that game _ .  Sinbad bites down again, this time against Ja’far’s jaw, knowing that if he can generate enough blood to effectively power two people, the mark should be gone by morning.  Ja’far kicks at him, and tightens down with what could be equal parts eagerness and pain, but Sinbad doesn’t let him up.  He bites again, at his shoulder, and once more, on a pectoral.  Only then, does he let Ja’far push him back over with a growl.  

It is far too fast, far too aggressive, and more of a contest than any sort of attempt to seek pleasure or satisfaction.  Which is why, when Sinbad has finally managed to bite, scratch, and eventually force orgasms out of both of them, he feels more like he’s finished a particularly unpleasant workout rather than a proper round of sex.  He lies on the bed panting slightly, watching the superficial wounds heal on both his and Ja’far’s skin.  And maybe he’s the tiniest bit physically satisfied, since he catches his thoughts wandering, not sure what it says about him that he finds gashes closing in front of his eyes to be commonplace, lying in bed next to his would-be murderer.  Sinbad forces his brain back on topic.

“Feel better now that that’s out of your system?”

“No.”  

“Pity.  It’d be much more fun to go slow, next time.”  Sinbad wasn’t exactly delighted with his first experience in many years, either.

“Said as if there will  _ be  _ a next time.”  

Sinbad gives a huff of frustration, and turns to grab Ja’far’s chin in his hand.  Enough is enough.  “You’re going to have to give up this front sometimes, before I do finally get fed up and leave.”  He sees a spark of fear in Ja’far’s eyes, which suprises him more than he thinks it should, though it is quickly masked under more anger.  “I’m grateful for what you’ve done, and I’d much rather stick around, clearly, but even I’ve got my limits.  I know you’ve had a rough time, and you don’t have to spill your guts to me or anyone, but you’ve got to at least stop being so  _ angry _ .”  

“Might as well tell me to stop breathing.  Everyone else will tell you the same.”

Sinbad rolls his eyes.  “Everyone  _ else  _ doesn’t live with you, so they humor you.  You’re not as good an actor as you think, Ja’far, and we all know it.  Just...try smiling next time you babysit.  Or laughing at a joke instead of spitting.  Or using words instead of knives.”  

“Sinbad, I don’t know who you think I am, but--”

He gives Ja’far’s cheeks one final squeeze, and a taunting peck on the lips before letting go and swinging his legs over the edge of the bed.  “I don’t care much who you are, just that you wake up tomorrow a bit better than him.  Goodnight, Ja’far.”  


	7. Seven

Sinbad jabs his fist out reflexively, and meets with little resistance.  It doesn’t matter too much, because the fight is over within seconds.  But still, he’s left staring at the path his hand had made, and doesn’t quite understand what happened.  

Ja’far comes striding delicately over, dodging wet, sticky patches, and looks at where Sinbad is staring.  “You ok?”

“Fine.”  He looks at his hand, then back down, trying to confirm what he already knows to be true.  “I blew his head off.”  

Ja’far looks down at the headless body, then at the smear of of blood, bone, and brains.  “Yes, I believe you did.”

“I didn’t mean to.”  

“It happens.”

Sinbad suddenly has the bodily realization of what he’s just done.  “You don’t just  _ happen  _ to blow someone’s skull off their shoulders!”  

“Sin, it’s alright,” Ja’far tries to soothe.  “It’s normal, until you learn to control it.  I’ve seen lots of vampires tear people limb from limb, you just haven’t been healthy or strong enough to do it, until now.”  

“It isn’t  _ normal  _ to blast someone’s head into powder!” 

“It’s not  _ powder,  _ more just… a bunch of mushy pieces.”  

Sinbad bends over to dry heave.

Ja’far pats awkwardly at his back.  “You’re very bad at this.  Possibly the worst vampire I’ve met.”  

“I’ll take that as a compliment,” he pants before gagging again.  “I think you would have made the better vampire of us,” he jokes.

Ja’far freezes and immediately drops his comforting hand.

“Ja’far?”  Sinbad sees the practiced, blank look on his face and flounders.  “Ja’far, you know I don’t mean it like that; it’s just that you’re so much more logical and practical about these things, and--” he cuts himself off when Ja’far turns on his heel and starts picking his way back towards his truck.  “Shit.”  

Ja’far throws his dirty boots in the bed of the truck, and Sinbad follows suit.  He tries to comfort Ja’far again, but his hand simply gets thrown off and his words ignored.  The ride back is silent and strained.  

Sinbad stays quiet the whole way home, even if he wants to talk.  He lets Ja’far open and slam the door and get in the shower alone.  Sinbad also showers after, quick to rinse all the incriminating grime off of his body.  What he doesn’t let Ja’far do is go to bed angry.  

“Ja’far,” Sinbad says seriously, grabbing his shoulder before he can roll over and go to sleep.  “I’m serious.  I only meant that you’re better equipped to use things I have than I am.  I don’t mean that you’re a monster.”  

Ja’far turns his back anyway.  “I am a monster, in my own way.  I knew that already, it just hurt to have you remind me.  Even monsters know I’m one of them.”  

“You’re not a monster.  You saved me.”  He holds back the bitter comment that  _ he  _ doesn’t like being called a monster either.  Ja’far has been better lately, and Sinbad knows he’s just feeling vulberable, to be going back to old habits.  

“You,” Ja’far laughs bitterly.  “The one and only.  Everyone else is dead or hates me.”  

Sinbad tentatively pets a hand over his hair.  “They don’t hate you.  You just make them uncomfortable because you do what they are all afraid to.”  

“Maybe they were afraid for a reason.  I wasn’t, you know.  Afraid.  I like the hard kills.  The rabid monsters are fun, the ones pretending to be human are better.”  

“Someone has to do it.”  Sinbad doesn’t try to pretend like it’s neat or inherently just.  “A few good acts to a few people don’t justify the murder of a dozen others.”  

“Then I can hardly say me killing a few monsters makes up for everything else I’ve done.”  

“I’m not sure weighing value and life is quite that simple.”  

Ja’far’s shoulders turn slightly inwards.  “I killed everyone who raised me, Sin.  People I grew up with, who fed me, who trained me, children even younger than I was.”  

“Well…” From what little Sinbad has gleaned of Ja’far’s past, it was probably not entirely unwarranted.  “You’ve got plenty of family now, alive and kicking.  And honestly, they probably deserved it.”  

“Children, Sinbad.  Kids who would barely be able to attend kindergarten, getting ripped apart by possessions they couldn’t contain.”  

And that is probably the crux of the issue.  The only moment he’d seen Ja’far truly seem to hesitate had been at the notion of killing a child.  Werewolf or not, he’d seen genuine sadness in Ja’far’s eyes, being forced to remember that Masrur was a child, and he’d nearly killed him.  

“We all make mistakes,” is the only comfort Sinbad can offer.

“It wasn’t a mistake,” Ja’far snaps.  “I would have run and either died or left them all to their own devices, but they were calling bigger and bigger demons.  The younger ones couldn’t….they were...” he pauses.  “‘Ripped apart at the seams’ doesn’t really cover it, but it’s the best analogy I can come up with.”  

“I stand by my original statement, then.  You did what had to be done.”

“I know that,” he bites out, harsh and loud and defiant.  Then he repeats it more softly.  “I know that.  But there were so many others.  Humans more monstrous than most  _ actual monsters  _ I’ve seen.  And yet it’s always someone’s father or brother or cousin that got treated right. And then there are the crying mothers, the fatherless children, the missing persons appeals.”  

“Finally admitting to having a conscience, are we?”  

“Shut up, Sin.”  

Sinbad can hear the slight reticence in his voice, even with the harsh tone.  He decides that’s enough torment for one night and  flops into bed, squishing against Ja’far’s side and throwing an arm clumsily over his waist.  

“Get off.”  

“No.”  He can tell by now when Ja’far really needs space, and when he’s just putting up a good show.  One day, maybe, he can convince Ja’far to just ask for comfort when he wants it; but until then, he’s going to have to read his moods carefully.  

“Get your wet hair off of me.”

“No.  Get a hair dryer.”

“You get a hair dryer.”

“I  _ would _ , but you keep telling me it’s an irresponsible investment, even though it’s like twenty five bucks.  Maybe you just like to watch me suffer.”  

“You’ve caught me,” he mutters.

Sinbad just rolls onto his side, snuggling up against Ja’far’s neck, mouthing absently over his shoulder.  It’s always difficult to ignore the thrum of blood beneath skin, but it’s becoming more habitual over time.  

“Leave me alone, Sin.”

“If you actually wanted to be left alone, I might.”  

Ja’far huffs, but grabs his hand from around his waist, bringing it up under his chin.  He still refuses to turn around and face Sinbad, but Sinbad decides he can work on that later.  

“Go to sleep, Ja’far.  You’ll feel better when you wake up in the morning.”

“ _ If  _ I wake up.  That stringy mess of hair is going to strangle me if you don’t put it up.”

Sinbad rolls his eyes, but pauses long enough to do just that, leaning precariously over the edge of the bed to fumble the lamp off.  He flops back down and resumes their awkward cuddle.  “Goodnight, Ja’far.  Don’t steal all the blankets again.”

“I do  _ not  _ steal the blankets!  Fuck you.”  


End file.
